


Overjoyed or Send Them Off?

by Basnatural



Series: Secrets and Lies [3]
Category: Bastille (Band)
Genre: Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Angst, Anxiety, Depression, Drama, Established Relationship, Family Drama, Fluff and Smut, M/M, Self-Harm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-05
Updated: 2017-07-02
Packaged: 2018-11-09 14:02:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 23
Words: 51,371
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11106075
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Basnatural/pseuds/Basnatural
Summary: After the events of Secrets and Lies, more drama unfolds and truths come to the surface.This is the second instalment of the Secrets and Lies universe





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hi guys, so I had a bit of inspiration this evening, even though I was going to rest for a while. Oh well!  
> I'm not sure if I will update as frequently as I have been but will try my best for you.  
> Please enjoy.

Chapter One

 

**_ Daily Mirror Online _ **

**_ Overjoyed or Send Them Off?! _ **

_Pop Indie group Bastille today stunned audiences at the first ever CornFest in Bude, Cornwall after the lead singer, Dan Smith (30), shockingly locked lips with keyboard player Kyle Simmons (29). Taking place immediately after their fan favourite ‘Of the Night’, Smith grabbed Simmons by the hand to give a passionate kiss. Neither man looked surprised at this turn of events and so the question is ‘how long has this been going on for’? No one from the band has been available for comment as yet, but sources backstage have confirmed the couple looked very happy afterward. But will this affect their fan base with parents of younger fans being unwilling to subject impressionable youths to overt LGBT behaviour? Only time will tell…_

\---

 

_@bastilledan @kyle_jsimmons sooooo happy to see this! Congratulations!_

_@bastilledan @kyle_jsimmons thank you so much! You are an inspiration to me and my partner! #relationshipgoals_

_@bastilledan @kyle_jsimmons Nooooooooo! #heartbroken_

_@bastilledan @kyle_jsimmons OMG I KNEW IT! #Dyle4eva_

_@bastilledan @kyle_jsimmons that’s disgusting! Why? Too ugly to get a woman?_

\---

 

It had only been 48 hours since the gig in Cornwall, but the press had grabbed on hard to the show of love between the two men in such an overt way – especially as Dan’s sexuality had always been ambiguous at best. They had arrived back from the south west and had been automatically thrown into the busy lifestyle of trying to field calls from reporters and attempting to deal with the onslaught of messages on social media.

 

“So the way I see it is we have two choices,” Dan says suddenly as he walks through from the kitchen in Kyle’s flat. Kyle’s flat was slightly bigger than Dan’s and was closer to the studio, so they had been holed up in there since they got back.

 

“Huh?” Kyle looks up from his phone at his boyfriend, clearly confused. He was relaxing on his blue Ikea sofa, legs crossed under him and lounging in an oversized purple sleeveless tank top with Garfield on the front and soft grey tracksuit bottoms. He hadn’t even run his hands through his hair, so bed head was a real thing for him this morning.

 

“Eloquent, Ky,” Dan says, cocks an eyebrow at him and leans against the doorframe of the kitchen. He was in grey pyjama shorts and a white undershirt.

 

“That’s a big word for this time in the morning, babe. Don’t flaunt your university English at me.” And he pouts at Dan, who gives him a wicked smile and stalks over to him and leans down and grabs his bottom lip between his teeth and bites softly. Kyle moves his hands around Dan’s neck and pulls him forward into a deeper kiss and Dan climbs on top of his lover to straddle his hips and get as close as he can as he licks into the other’s mouth.

 

“So, two options, you said,” Kyle asks when they break apart.

 

“Yeah, so option one is we don’t make any statement and just go around like we would normally.”

 

“And option two?” Kyle enquires.

 

“We make a statement or something, or at least put something online?” Dan says.

 

Kyle thinks for a minute, quickly going through the pros and cons in his head. “I’m going for option one.” He says finally.

 

“Oh thank god, I so didn’t want to have to talk to anyone about this!” Dan answers, relieved.

 

“We’re like one mind, babe,” Kyle says and pulls him forward for another kiss.

 

“What were you doing on your phone anyway?” Dan asks when they come up for air again.

 

“Text from mum. Wants me to go and see them, not too sure why. Wanna come?”

 

“To spend time with the Simmons’s? I’ve met them like twice.” Dan says awkwardly. “And what you’ve said about them and your sexuality, do you think they’ll be happy to see me now?” While Kyle’s parents were accepting of his bisexuality, they had always made it known that they would prefer him with a woman over a man.

 

“You’ve met them more than that you idiot.” Kyle admonishes, and strategically avoids his other question. He really didn’t know how his parents were going to react at all. “Come on, I wanna show you off now I can,” he pleads, widening his deep brown eyes in a way he knew Dan couldn’t resist forever.

 

“When?” Dan concedes finally, when the puppy dog eyes get too much for him.

 

Kyle does a fist pump quickly, almost hitting Dan in the back in the process. “Sorry…” he quickly apologises and Dan gives him a disapproving look. “Tomorrow morning? We can get the train up?”

 

“Well I’m not gonna run it, you’ve seen me run,” Dan says quickly.

 

“You’ve got a cute run,” Kyle says quietly, and Dan gives him a fond look and kisses him again.

 

“You have to say that,” Dan says and stands up. Kyle makes the cute whimper that breaks Dan’s heart break every time and grabs for his hand before he can walk away. “Well I need to go and pack don’t I? So, should really go home and do that.” He replies to the puppy dog eyes.

 

“Alright, I suppose so.” Kyle accepts. “Are we going out tonight?”

 

“Aren’t you sick of me already?” Dan asks and gets a look back at him as if to say ‘I’m in love with an idiot’. “OK, _yes_ , we’re going out tonight, but I need to go home first yeah?” and Kyle nods emphatically at him.

 

\---

 

Dan finally gets back to his flat around midday after showering and changing at Kyle’s which inevitably led to morning sex as they were having an incredibly difficult time keeping their hands off each other now they had gone public.

 

After climbing the stairs and throwing his bag full of dirty washing in the kitchen next to the washing machine he decides he actually has to do some work. Not only had he about four different songs half written, but he had to do some mixing and producing for friends as well.

 

Before he was even able to get his MacBook open, his phone starts to ring. He looks at the screen and seeing who it was he makes a big sigh and answers it.

 

“Dave!” He answers brightly. “Got home alright then? Thought I would have heard from you sooner to be honest.”

 

“Have you been watching what’s been happening?” The man on the other end of the phone asks. _‘Alright then_ ,’ Dan thinks, ‘ _no small talk then’_.

 

“Well as a lot of the social media is looked after by me, yes I have been keeping an eye on things. Why? I’m seeing no real problems.”

 

“What are you going to do about it? I keep having people ringing me for comment.” Dave carries on, sounding more and more pissed off by the second.

 

“Nothing.”

 

“Nothing?” Dave asks.

 

“Nothing.” Dan confirms. “Me and Kyle talked about it, and we’re not gonna do anything. It’s not a big deal Dave.”

 

“Fine.” Dave snaps down the phone and hangs up on Dan.

 

“Hello?” Dan says and looks at his phone screen before realising that he had been hung up on. “Oh well,” and he throws his phone next to him on his old comfy sofa.

 

He goes back to turn his MacBook on and goes to get a drink from the kitchen. Heading back into the living room with his Game of Thrones cup of coffee, and his phone starts ringing again.

 

“Y’ello?” He answers without looking at the caller, putting the phone between his ear and his shoulder so he can start typing and sorting things out.

 

“Daniel, you never rang me!” comes a female voice on the other side of the phone, slight accent clearly audible.

 

“Sorry mum, got distracted.” He replies, still being distracted by what he was trying to do on his screen.

 

“Yes, we did see.”

 

Dan stops what he’s doing and grimaces to himself. He starts to pay a bit more attention to the phone call. “Yeah, maybe should have warned you about that…” he says and trails off by the end of the sentence.

 

“Oh, darling I don’t care what you did on stage.” His mum tells him, matter of factly. “No you need to have a talk with Ella though.”

 

“Why? What’s wrong with her?” His little sister was the apple of the family’s eye and whenever she was upset, everyone did their best to try and cheer her up, especially Dan who had always had a close relationship with her.

 

“I don’t want to say anything out of turn,” his mum says and doesn’t say anything afterwards.

 

“Well can you at least give me a hint?” Dan asks, becoming more and more confused.

 

“Alright,” his mother sighs down the phone. “I don’t know if it’s because you’ve not really been in touch because of touring, or because Sharon is now working with you, or whether you never told her you were gay, but she is extremely upset about everything that happened at the weekend.”

 

“Upset with me or the situation?” Dan tries to clarify.

 

“Oh I don’t know Dan; you would be best to ask her yourself.” His mum replies, frustrated herself. “It’s been a nightmare around here since Sunday afternoon, that’s all I have to say.”

 

“OK, OK. I’m going out tonight and away for a night with Kyle to his parents tomorrow, but how about I get her to come and stay when I get back? I’ve got nothing coming up for a while and she’s finished her exams hasn’t she?” Dan asks, trying to suggest a way in which he can help.

 

His mum agrees and they hang up saying their goodbyes to one another. He opens up his texting app and starts a new message to his sister.

 

_Dan – Hey! So wanna come down and stay for the weekend? Come down Thursday? We can do stuff x_

 

He sends the message and waits for the reply to come through while cutting parts of tracks away and inserting them elsewhere. He becomes overly engrossed in the task he is doing when he doesn’t even realise he has received replies.

 

_Ella – I don’t know Dan._

_Ella – I think I’ve got something on_

_Ella – thanks for asking though_

Dan reads the messages again. This was unlike his baby sister. She usually jumped at the chance to come down to London and hang out with him, especially with it being so close to her 16th birthday…he has another thought.

 

_Dan – Come on! I’ll take you out for a nice meal, we can go shopping for your birthday…I want to spend time with you! I miss you! You can see Sharon and spend time with the guys…_

He hears nothing straight away so he puts his phone down again and continues working. He was starting to worry about what exactly was causing the problem with his sister when she finally texts back after about half an hour.

 

_Ella – mum says I should come so I guess I will. See you on Thursday._

Is all the message says. No kisses, no excitement. Dan was really starting to worry about it when he realises the time and recognises he had to get ready before Kyle came to get him for their night out.

 

He showers – again, because the muggy late May day had made him stickier than he had been for a while - and then changed into black jeans and a skinny fit red and blue checked shirt. He styled his hair and put his contacts in while he waited for his boyfriend to arrive. He had no idea what exactly they were going to be doing tonight, but he was excited that for the first time since they had gotten together he would be able to spend time in public with the love of his life and not have to worry about people seeing them.

 

There was a knock on his door and he picked up his wallet and keys and headed out towards whatever was waiting for him.

 

 

 

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OK, mainly fluff and smut in this chapter. I can't apologise lol! x

Chapter Two

Opening the door, Dan finds Kyle standing on the other side of it. He sucks in a deep breath at the sight of him. He’s made an effort himself, wearing a lighter coloured checked shirt, with short sleeves and he’s rolled them up further like only Kyle can. His hair is gelled to perfection, swept back off of his face and he’s trimmed his beard as well.

 

“You look amazing,” Kyle whispers to Dan as he’s still silently appraising his boyfriend.

 

“You don’t scrub up too bad yourself,” Dan replies, licking his lips unconsciously at the sight before him. He notices the younger man’s eyes tracking the movement of his tongue as it moves.

 

“Oh,” Kyle suddenly remembers, “I bought you these.” He holds out a thin white box towards him and Dan takes them from him and laughs.

 

“Mikado?” He says through the giggles.

 

“Well, it’s a first date, really,” Kyle explains to him, and shyly lifts his arm to scratch at the back of his neck indicating he really was nervous. “I wasn’t gonna buy you flowers, cos that’s too gay, even for me. So I bought you chocolate twigs instead.”

 

“Thank you?” Dan asks rather than says to him and starts laughing again. He quickly puts the box of biscuits inside his flat and head out to his lover. “So, first date huh?” he says as they head down the stairs together, and Kyle nods his head. “What you got planned then? You gonna woo me?”

 

“I’m going old school dude.” Kyle boasts proudly. “Dinner and dancing!” and he grabs Dan’s hand in his, intertwining their fingers together to get even closer to the man. Internally Dan’s heart soars as he realises this is the first time they’ve been able to do this in public and he relishes the feel of Kyle’s cold metal rings against his own fingers.

 

“Can’t wait,” Dan replies and squeezes his hand.

 

\---

 

“Pizza Express?” Dan says incredulously as the waiter leaves them their menus and takes their drinks order.

 

“What?” Kyle says affronted. “First Date, Daniel…you don’t spend lots when you don’t know where its gonna end up!” he adds with his normal sarcastic charm.

 

“I’ve landed myself a Prince…” Dan mumbles under his breath, and Kyle chuckles to himself from behind his menu.

 

They eat and chat about everything and nothing for over an hour completely uninterrupted. The beauty of living in London was always that you could blend in effortlessly as no one was ever looking at anyone else.

 

Eventually Kyle looks at his phone and realises the time and signals the waiter for the bill.

 

“So I take it we’ll be spitting this then?” Dan asks cheekily.

 

“I’m not that cheap Smith!” Kyle retorts as he looks at the price of the meal. “Also…I’ve got a coupon.” He adds and Dan can’t help himself at that and he bursts into fits of laughter. He pays the bill and they head out of the restaurant.

 

“Where now?” Dan asks innocently.

 

“Down here,” he says quickly and pulls Dan by the wrist down a dark alley, and pushes him against the wall.

 

Kyle crowds into Dan’s space and put his hands to Dan’s face and trails his fingers down his cheeks and placing his thigh between Dan’s legs. Dan gulps slowly and stares into the deep brown eyes of the other man.

 

“I’m sorry about the meal.” He whispers to him. “I know you deserve better than that, but we’ve got to be somewhere and that was the quickest place I could think of.”

 

“It’s OK,” Dan replies and gulps again. Instinctively he licks his lips again, and Kyle’s eyes blow wider until the brown is almost completely overtaken with black.

 

“Oh god,” Kyle mutters, and claims his partner’s lips with his own. The kiss starts off slow and sensual, Kyle’s hands moving to behind Dan’s head and neck to bring him closer to him. He needed this more than he needed to breathe in that moment. Kissing Dan was the most natural thing he could do and he couldn’t remember a time when he wasn’t allowed or able to do it.

 

Dan is the one who deepens the kiss, needing to taste more of the man he had given his heart to. He licks against the seam of Kyle’s mouth, and as the man gasps into the motion he kicks into his mouth and makes the kiss as dirty as he possibly can, licking teeth and the roof of his mouth.

 

Uncharacteristically Kyle is the one who ends the kiss first, resting his forehead against Dan’s and panting quickly.

 

“We do actually have to be somewhere,” he says apologetically. Dan doesn’t say anything, but rubs his nose against the younger man and rubs them together in an act that is somehow more sensual than anything they’ve done until that point.

 

“OK,” he says simply. “Lead the way gorgeous.”

 

\---

 

They end up standing in a queue outside an unassuming club nearby. For a Tuesday night, the queue was pretty long and Dan was looking around suspiciously, trying to see exactly what his boyfriend had brought him to. Kyle pulled him against him so his back was resting against his chest and wrapped his arms around his waist to keep him there.

 

“You guessed yet?” Kyle asks softly in his ear. Dan shivers the way he always does when the other man does that to him. Dan shakes his head and Kyle sighs as he puts his hand in his pocket and pulls out two tickets and hands them to him.

 

“You’re kidding me? Ky!” Dan exclaims excitedly as he looks at the name on the tickets and instantly recognises it. Dan had been waxing lyrical about this particular DJ and producer for months – he was someone who specifically specialised in amazing mash ups and Dan had loved absolutely everything he had heard after finding him online.  And his amazing boyfriend had managed to get him tickets to see him. “I fucking love you Kyle Simmons!” he shouts and punches him lightly on the shoulder. A few of the people in the crowd look around at that but they quickly go back to their own conversations.

 

The queue eventually starts moving forward and Kyle hands the tickets over to the bouncers when they get to the front and they get their hands stamped so they can get inside. Inside the club is nicer than it appears from outside. There is a large dancefloor with decks set up at the head of it and Dan recognised the flurry of activity around them as last minute preparations before a performance. There was a wooden bar along the other side of the room and tables and booths set up in rich reds to compliment the yellows and browns of the wood. Metal poles were set up in various areas for the drunker of the clientele to use at their own discretion, and there was a staircase leading upstairs to where it boasted pool tables and more seating.

 

Kyle gets them both bottles of beer and they find an empty table to lean on and wait for the show to start. Dan has his arm around Kyle and his hand is resting in the back pocket of his jeans as they drink and wait and that is when someone finally recognises them and comes up to ask them a question and for a picture. Dan has to admit he was surprised it had taken that long considering the gossip columnists current obsession with them, but they obliged the girl and her friend and were left alone afterwards.

 

It takes another 40 minutes before the DJ is ready to start and there is a surge of people to the dancefloor as the opening song starts and Kyle and Dan are swept along with them in their excitement. The music and set is amazing and Dan has the time of his life dancing like no one is watching and being able to grind against his lover and dance in his arms in public.

 

Kyle spends most of the evening marvelling in the quirky moves of the singer, the way he always does when he watches him dance, and he can’t keep his hands off of him. Near the end of the gig, a group of girls he had barely noticed before now end up dancing up to them and start to dance with Dan – and Kyle by extension as he was there.

 

The group was made up of slim 20-somethings with a range of blonde, brunette and redheads all dressed to kill and made up like something out of the cover of Vogue. A couple of them seemed to want to dance with Kyle, but the majority of them were more interested in the cheeky grin and dimples of the other man.

 

He watched his boyfriend dance with each of the women and place his hand on their hips as he moved and throw his head back as he did so often when they were having sex. In his head he knew he was just dancing to the music as it moved him, but in his heart he felt jealous.

 

The music finishes and the DJ thanks the crowd and heads off. Dan is exhausted from the constant motion and excitement of everything that has happened and looks at Kyle with a wide grin on his face. The girls are still hanging around, so Dan tries politely to say goodbye so he can move fully over to his lover. They don’t seem to be moving, so Kyle bullishly strides over and grabs his boyfriend’s hand and pulls him out of the throng of girls. He pulls him towards his body and grabs his hips before pressing a possessive and filthy kiss to the man’s mouth as if marking his own property.

 

Breaking apart, Kyle looks towards the group and raises his eyebrows and the girls just start to slowly sidle away realising that their attempts all night had been in vain.

 

“What was that for?” Dan asks, still smiling.

 

“You’re _mine_ ,” Kyle growls dangerously low in his ear, still watching the last of the girls moving away from them. The clear primal possessiveness the other man was showing was affecting Dan in all the right ways and he just nods slowly without looking at anything than the wildness in Kyle’s eyes.

 

“Let’s get out of here,” is all he says in response.

 

\---

 

They get back to Dan’s flat as it was closer and they rush up the stairs to get to the flat. Breathless by the ties they get there, Dan fumbles with his keys to get the door open and Kyle is clearly getting impatient, as he starts to slide his hands up the back of Dan’s shirt and starts to kiss at his earlobe.

 

“Uhgn” is all Dan is able to say as he wrenches the door open and pulls his lover through with him.

 

Dan pushes Kyle against the door of the flat and laps at his lips until his opens up for him and grants him entry to his mouth.

 

“Dan…” Kyle pants between kisses. “Dan, please…”

 

“What? What is it baby?” Dan asks breathlessly.

 

“I need you to fuck me…” Kyle pleads and Dan stills and looks deeply in his eyes. Dan hadn’t topped with Kyle before, and he had always assumed that Kyle wouldn’t be interested.

 

“Are you sure?” Dan has to ask to make sure he isn’t dreaming the request.

 

“I’m not a blushing virgin Dan, fuck me already!” Kyle gets out with frustration, and Dan quickly agrees and pulls him towards the bedroom.

 

They both shed clothes as they move and they are both quickly very naked and rubbing against each other on top of the double bed in Dan’s room. Both cocks straining and leaking as soon as they are free, neither one is going to last long after the amazing night they have had together.

 

Dan finds his bottle of lube and deftly slicks up his fingers and reaches between Kyle’s legs, teasing as his dick and balls as he goes. As he finds Kyle’s tight hole and strokes over it, Kyle gasps loudly and Dan bites down on his chest and worries the area until he was sure there would definitely be a mark there in the morning. As soon as he was certain his mark was left he breaches the muscle he is teasing and enters one finger all the way to the knuckle and probes around inside his partner’s tight heat.

 

Kyle pants harder and faster as Dan’s finger pumps in and out quickly and then moans as a second finger is inserted, causing a burn he hadn’t felt in a long time. Dan scissors his fingers to widen the opening and quickens the pace as Kyle loosens around him.

 

“More?” He asks, so aroused by now he hopes against hops Kyle just tells him to get on with it.

 

“Just you Dan, fuck I just need you in me right now!” and Dan does a mental fist pump and moves further between his partner’s legs and lining up the swollen head of his shaft with the waiting pucker.

 

As he breaches the first ring of muscle, both of the men groan in unison. It had been a while since Dan had topped anyone and he had missed the tightness that always came with the act. He slides slowly inside, friction almost too much for him as he stills, waiting for Kyle to get used to the intrusion.

 

“Keep going!” Kyle gasps out, and Dan slides further in until his hips are flush with the other man. He relishes the feeling for a moment until Kyle glares up at him and urges with only his eyes to move or regret it.

 

Dan pulls out just as slowly as he entered until he was almost completely unsheathed and then slams back into his lover and they both cry out in pleasure at the feeling that overcomes them. He grinds his hips in and out of the heat enveloping him and he loses time in the rhapsody of the feeling within him.

 

He shifts and knows from the crying that he has hit Kyle’s prostate, but all he can see is white sparks as his own arousal starts to rush towards its own peak. He holds onto one of Kyle’s hips and moves his other hand to grab onto his neglected shaft and pumps in a complimentary rhythm with his hips, until Kyle was screaming his name in delight. Dan was determined he was not going to come before the other man so he keeps up the rhythm and position until he feels Kyle’s warm seed spill over his hand and feels his muscle squeeze against him in release.

 

As soon as he feels this he pumps his hips a few more times and he feels his own release spilling out of him and filling Kyle from the inside out.

 

Coming down from their high, with shallow panting breaths, they hold each other as they tremble from the best orgasms either of them had had in a long time. They both realised that if they can stay like this forever, nothing would ever tear them apart.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoyed!  
> Please leave Kudos and Comments if you feel like it! It makes me write faster x


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey all...just wanted to add a quick note in here....I DO NOT KNOW ANY OF THE FAMILY OF THE BOYS lol. 
> 
> I am sorry if this offends anyone, but these are characters I've obviously made up and serve a purpose. 
> 
> Please enjoy though!!! Thanks for reading : )

Chapter Three

Kyle staying that night hadn’t been part of the plan, but after the previous night he hadn’t the energy to leave and go home. The following morning was an early start for them so that they could head back to his flat so he could change and then head out from Euston.

 

Kyle opens the door and heads into the bedroom to change quickly while Dan switches the news on for background noise. He looks at the huge cheese plant in the corner of the living room and sees one of the leafs has a huge hole in it. He gets up to have a look at it a bit closer and notices a crack in the plaster behind it.

 

“Ky, why has your plant got a hole in it?” He shouts through to the bedroom.

 

Kyle comes back out pulling on a red t-shirt over his head to see what Dan was talking about. “Oh. That. Yeah, me and the plant had a disagreement so I threw my phone at it.”

 

Raising his eyebrows above the frames of his glasses and widening his eyes, Dan just slowly nods as his crazy boyfriend heads back into the bedroom to finish getting ready. He comes back out a couple of seconds later a faded blue denim jacket with sheepskin collar and a brown leather messenger bag over his shoulder.

 

“That all you taking?” Dan asks.

 

“Dan, we’re going one night. I think this is all I need!” He replies, and he pulls his partner toward him to give him a deep, sensual kiss. “Come on, let’s go.”

 

As they head out the door again, Dan gives a last look at the plant. “How can you have a disagreement with a cheese plant?”

 

\---

 

It’s another couple of hours before they finally get to the station and meet up with Kyle’s dad. He’s waiting on the platform for him and Kyle gives him a brief one armed hug when he gets to him.

 

“Hey Dad, how’s it going?” he greets him. Kyle’s father is slightly taller than his son and just as slim. He has greying hair, but is clean shaven and he has the same deep brown eyes.

 

Dan silently hovers behind his paramour while they greet each other, and then is presented with a hand to shake from the patriarch.

 

“Dan, good to see you again,” Mr Simmons says to him, and Dan shakes the hand offered as firmly as he can. They head off towards the family car – a Mercedes estate, which Dan knows they have been driving for at least 10 years – and settle in for the quick journey back to the family house.

 

The house Kyle grew up in was a detached 1930’s brick house which had been extended significantly to fit the whole family as it grew. It was in the middle of any other normal south east England housing estate from its time.

 

Kyle was the youngest of three and unlike the Smith family where the youngest was doted upon, he was often the butt of jokes and tricks from the rest of the family. However, due to the large extensions on the house everyone was able to have their own room and at least he was able to get away from the bickering when he was younger. They pulled into the driveway and Dan had his first proper look at the brick building.

 

It was a typical red brick structure with rounded bay windows at the front and areas of white cladding surrounding the top floor. The front garden was large and had a significant hedge surrounding it. The lawn was well manicured and late spring flowers were blooming around the borders of it.

 

Dan climbs out of the back seat of the car and takes a big deep breath inwards as he steels himself for what might happen. They head inside the house and Mrs Simmons fusses through from the kitchen wiping her hands on a tea towel before pulling her youngest into a tight bone breaking hug.

 

“Kyle! It’s so good to see you,” she coos at him and Dan can see his boyfriend’s eyes widen and then roll heavenward as he tries to get away from her. “Why haven’t you shaved yet?” she adds critically. “And why do you smell like cigarette smoke?”

 

“Mum, you saw me last week and we had _exactly the same_ conversation then…” Kyle tries to interrupt and Dan sniggers to himself. The woman was not even as tall as Kyle’s shoulders and had her long dark hair tied back into a plait behind her. She had the same darker skin tone as her son, and she was clearly an attractive woman when she was younger.

 

“Well, until you stop looking like a Big Issue seller, I’m going to keep saying it,” she grouses at him. “Come on boys, you must be starving, I’ve made lunch,” and she grabs Kyle’s hand and pulls him into the large dining kitchen where there are sandwiches set up all over the table.

 

Dan and Kyle sit down next to each other, while Kyle’s mother puts the kettle on and turns around to look at them, her eyes narrowing suspiciously at the two men.

 

“So, I didn’t watch what happened at the weekend, but your brother kept me updated,” she starts. “Now what you two get up to isn’t any of my bother, but Kyle I do need you to go and meet a woman I’ve found for you this afternoon.”

 

“Huh?” Kyle questions, feeling very confused and just as articulate as ever.

 

“Well, this girl is perfect for you, and I just want you to make absolutely sure that you haven’t made a mistake before carrying on with all of…this,” she says, matter of factly while waving her fingers between the two of them to indicate what she meant.

 

“Mum, no…” Kyle starts, but is immediately interrupted.

 

“Kyle, don’t be rude,” Dan says, desperately trying to hide a smirk from his face. He was very secure in their relationship to let Kyle’s mum try whatever she wanted. “This sounds like a nice thing to do! I’ll even come with if you want?”

 

“See, Dan knows what I mean!” Mrs Simmons exclaims, completely unaware of any ulterior motive coming from the singer. “And if it doesn’t work out then that’s that!”

 

“What’s her name?” Dan asks curiously.

 

“Robyn,” the woman replies. “I met her mother at church and we hit it off! She’s into music as well, Kyle and seems very bright. And she likes cats.” She adds as if that was the most amazing coincidence ever.

 

“Mum…you don’t go to church.” Kyle says. “You don’t believe in God…”

 

“She went for a christening last week,” his father whispers in his ear. “Let this play out man or you’ll never hear the end of it.” He adds, obviously resigned to the craziness coming from his wife.

 

\---

 

“So, welcome to the crazy life of the Simmons Family!” Kyle says as he and Dan walk down the road to the nearby café they were meeting this woman at. It was mid-afternoon and they were both stuffed after being fed sandwiches for over an hour, but they were off to the potential ‘love of Kyle’s life’ that his mother couldn’t shut up about.

 

Dan reaches out for Kyle’s hand and pulls his lover towards him in a fierce hug.

 

“Seriously, it’s fine.” He concedes. “If this is what she needs to get it out of her system then it’s nothing. We’ll go, have coffee and go back saying ‘ _thanks but no thanks’_.” And he chuckles to himself.

 

“I honestly have no idea why she’s like this!” Kyle exclaims. “My brother always says she was annoyed when I started singing _‘I kissed a boy and I liked it’_ at a family party once, basically outing myself to whoever heard it, but I honestly don’t remember that night and no one ever mentioned it again…” he trails off as they get to the small coffee shop they were heading for.

 

They pull the door open and Dan just claps his hand off of his boy’s shoulder in sympathy and lets him walk through first.

 

The café was small, but nicely decorated inside. It was done up like a retro 60’s diner, but modernised and had booths all around the walls. In the corner, sitting in a mint green coloured leatherette booth was the only patron. It was a slim girl with long blonde hair, aged somewhere in her mid 20’s. She looked up from her phone as they entered and looked absolutely miserable as the two men walked towards her.

 

“Hi,” Kyle says to the girl. “Are you Robyn?”

 

“Yup, that’s me.” She says dejectedly. “Kyle?” she asks in return.

 

“Uh-huh.” He replies and sits down. “Oh, this is Dan.” He adds and points towards him as he sits down. “Hope you don’t mind he came alone?”

 

“Nah that’s fine. To be honest, I would have cancelled if I had your number…I feel so embarrassed but I’m actually seeing someone and my mum set this up for me…”

 

“Oh my god!” Kyle shouts, a huge smile suddenly beaming out of his face. “Me too!”

 

“Does your mum not approve of your other half either?” the girl asks him also smiling widely.

 

“Oh, uhm, well…” the man starts to stutter and looks towards Dan awkwardly.

 

“So let me introduce myself properly,” Dan butts in. “I’m Dan, Kyle’s boyfriend…” and he sticks his hand out to shake the girl’s and she bursts out laughing at him, while shaking his hand enthusiastically.

 

“Oh. My. God. Well obviously out mothers are made for each other,” she manages to get out in between bursts of giggles, and the men look at her strangely.

 

“My other half? It’s a woman.” She answers matter of factly at the unasked question, and she motions over to the barista behind the counter for three coffees to be brought to them.

 

\---

 

It turns out to be a much better afternoon than was expected for all of them, and they all exchange phone numbers before heading off in their separate directions.

 

The men head back towards the family house and just before they get there, Kyle has them stop in a semi-secluded side street. Dan looks at him when they stop.

 

“I want a cigarette and this is usually where I come for one so I don’t get the eyeball of judgement from the mother.” Kyle says to him.

 

Dan breathes out a huff that sounds like a small laugh and hugs his boyfriend quickly. He reaches up for a quick kiss and steals it before Kyle realises what’s happening.

 

“All I can think of is how you looked last night…” Dan whispers seductively in the other man’s ear and pushes him towards the shop front they stopped by. “We have got to do that again soon…” he continues and a small noise comes from the back of Kyle’s throat before he comes to his senses and pushes his cocktease boyfriend away from him

 

“Dude! That’s not playing fair!” he shouts and storms off round the corner to light his cigarette. Dan giggles to himself, enjoying the extreme reaction he had elicited from the man.

 

Dan had noticed he had a text from Ella sitting on his phone when recording the number of their new friend, so while Kyle moped around the corner, he clicks the message open to look at it.

 

_Ella – have booked train and will get in at 4pm. I don’t want to see Kyle while I’m there._

 

Aghast at what he was reading, he types out a quick reply to his sister.

 

_Dan – Why? What’s he done?_

_Ella – I just don’t Dan. I’m not coming if you can’t guarantee it._

_Dan – OK. I’ll see what I can do_

“What have you done to my sister?” Dan asks incredulously to his partner when he turns to find him.

 

“Nothing, why?”

 

“She doesn’t want to see you this weekend. Won’t tell me why.”

 

Kyle furrows his eyebrows and exhales the smoke he was holding. “Huh,” he says. “Come to think of it she’s stopped texting me this week too.”

 

“Why was my baby sister texting you?” Dan asks, confused himself.

 

“I gave her my number last time we were there. She asked for it after the dance, and we were just chatting.” He says simply.

 

Realisation starts to dawn on the singer. “When did she stop texting you?” he asks.

 

“Uhm, she texted on Sunday morning to wish us luck for the gig.” And this revelation just hits Dan hard.

 

He thinks back to the night of the dance, where he was meeting Sharon for the first time and having to deal with all of the fallout following it. Suddenly, he remembers everything else. How dressed up his sister was that night. How happy she was to get that compliment from Kyle. How she had dragged them both onto the dancefloor and then wangled it so she was dancing a slow dance with the keyboard player.

 

He chuckles mirthlessly to himself as it all falls into place.

 

“My sister has a crush.” He reveals, and Kyle looks at him questioningly. “On my boyfriend.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments and Kudo's most welcome!! I love hearing from everyone and love to hear what you guys think might happen!
> 
> Thanks again for reading and the love x


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter Four

Explaining to Kyle’s mum that Robyn definitely wasn’t the woman that Kyle was destined to be with was actually easier that they imagined it would be. His dad had clearly had a talk with her when they were out and prepared her for the very real possibility that Kyle was not going to end up with this girl.

 

They spent a relatively normal night in the family home. They excused themselves after dinner which happened to be Indian takeaway and head up to Kyle’s room to get some rest.

 

“Oh, Kyle!” his mother shouted from the living room as they started to head upstairs.

 

“Yeah?” he shouts back to her, not bothering to go back to see what she wanted.

 

“Dan can sleep on the blow up mattress or in your brother’s room. The beds are all made!” and there is a coughing noise from the direction of Mr Simmons’s seat to get her attention. “What? Oh!” she says as if realising she had missed a large piece of information. “Never mind!” she finishes, and the men both look at each other trying to hide smirks and sniggers.

 

Moving into the bedroom, Dan looks slowly around everything trying to understand a bit more of Kyle’s past. He still wishes he knew him back then. Maybe his school life and childhood would have been a lot happier and interesting if he had.

 

The room is slightly larger than he expected it would be. It had a king size bed in the middle of it and a desk at the side. A large bookcase filled with books on music is sitting in the corner and there are photos and posters all over the walls of old friends, bands and movies he had clearly loved over the years.

 

He turns around and puts his bag on the bed in front of him and sees Kyle staring at him from the doorway, before turning and shutting the door.

 

“So welcome to, like, 16-year-old Kyle…” he says shyly as he moves towards the bed himself and collapses on top of it.

 

“Yeah, it’s like a time machine in here!” Dan says, still looking at all the photos, and Kyle groans in embarrassment. “Is this you?” he asks and points at an old photo on the wall. It’s a group of teenagers – possible about 16 or 17 – all grouped around a table in school uniforms. The boy at the front was clearly Kyle. He was a little chubbier in the face, no facial hair, but same soulful brown eyes and cheeky grin staring directly at the camera.

 

“Yes…” Kyle admits. “God. See that girl there?” and he points at the girl just behind him in the photo. She had short, shoulder length dyed copper hair. She had a fun look on her face and was quite pretty for a girl of her age. Dan nods. “That was my first girlfriend. And that guy there,” pointing to the boy sitting next him. “That was the first guy I fucked.”

 

“Wow…you kept it all in the group eh?” Dan laughs. Kyle falls backwards onto the bed and drops his hands to his face to hide his shame.

 

“Apparently I was a bit of a slut!” Kyle jokes from behind his hands.

 

Dan moves away from the wealth of teasing material – mentally filing it away for later use – and walks over to the bed. He leans against the end of the bed straddling his lovers legs and kneels down to tower over him. He reaches down to pull Kyle’s long fingers away from his face, and stares into the deep russet eyes looking up at him.

 

“Oh I’m sure you were,” he purrs quietly at him, and he presses forward to lightly nip at his lower lip and suck it into his own mouth. Kyle whimpers, and tries to reach up to chase his partner’s lips as he pulls away. Dan releases his hands and reaches to his face to stroke Kyle’s coarse facial hair around his lips.

 

“KYLE!” a male voice suddenly comes shouting from downstairs, shattering whatever bubble was surrounding them in that minute.

 

“YEAH DAD?” Kyle shouts back after groaning loudly. Dan carefully moves back from the bad, avoiding the clear arousal in the other man’s jeans and trying to fight back his own at the same time. Kyle slowly sits up and shuffles uncomfortably towards the door, to open it a crack and peer out.

 

“Mum wants to know if you want a cup of tea!” his dad shouts back at him. Kyle rolls his eyes and looks back at Dan with a raised eyebrow. Dan chuckles and shrugs as if to say ‘sure, why not’.

 

\---

 

Waking up the next morning was slow and relaxing for both men. Dan had fallen asleep with Kyle’s arm around him and he hadn’t moved at all during the night. Both men were naked apart from boxers and just having the constant body warmth near each other had been comforting and had allowed them both to fall into a deep, dreamless slumber.

 

Because Dan had to be back in the city to meet Ella, they decided to leave pretty soon after a late breakfast to give them time to travel themselves. Mr Simmons took them back to the station, and Mrs Simmons gave both of the men strong hugs and telling them both to visit frequently.

 

Back in the city, there was not enough time to get back to the flat and then go back out again, so they headed out for a late lunch together. They ended up going to a fusion chain restaurant in Leicester Square. They descend the stairs into the basement location where they had been a number of times before and wait to be seated at the long communal tables before placing their orders.  

 

Chatting among themselves and waiting for the drinks and lunch to arrive, a group of teenagers come over to them, shyly, but determined in the throng of the London lunch crowd.

 

“Hi, sorry to interrupt, but can we have a photo please?” the lead girl asks shyly, and eyeing the way the two men were holding each other’s hand on top of the table as they sat across from each other.

 

Accommodating to the last, Dan obviously agrees and the selfie is taken of each of them and they rush off giggling and shrieking something about ‘#dylewatch’.

 

“What the fuck is dylewatch?” Kyle asks Dan, astounded.

 

“I don’t know,” Dan replies, shrugging his shoulders. “I barely pay attention to our stuff on there.” And they both forget about it when their food arrives and they can tuck in.

 

\---

 

At five to four, the lovers finally part so that Dan can attempt to keep his attempt at keeping Ella away from Kyle. It was a close call as Kyle had turned into an octopus and was refusing to let go of the older man. It finally led to Dan threatening to withdraw all forms of physical contact before the younger man agreed to go with a searing kiss which only left Dan wanting more. Kyle sauntered away, knowing exactly what he had done and gave a quick backward glance and wink at Dan as he left.

 

He turns back towards the platforms and arrivals board as he sees his baby sister walking out with a trolley bag being pulled behind her. She’s wearing her normal tight fitting jeans, Adidas gazelles and tight t-shirt and has her hair flowing around her face. He starts walking toward her and she sees him and startles. Looking as if she is stealing herself for something awful, he can see her taking a deep breath and walk more purposefully toward him.

 

“Hello!” he says cheerfully as he gets closer to her. He goes to give her his normal tight hug, but she avoids it and just waves at him.

 

“Hi.” She says to him and gives him her back when he gestures for it.

 

“You alright?” He asks her, trying to keep the conversation light as the head out to the taxi rank to get a cab back to his flat.

 

“Yep.” She says and gets her phone out and ignores him again.

 

Dan sighs to himself and can only think that the short journey to the flat was going to be a long one.

 

Once they arrive and they make it up the stairs, Ella throws herself on the sofa she’s going to be using as a bed for the weekend and curls up while flicking through whatever on her phone. Dan heads to the kitchen and pulls a couple of cans of diet coke out of the fridge and throws her one.

 

She catches it at the last minute, as Dan walks towards her and says, “we need to have a talk I think.”

 

“Do we?” She replies dourly.

 

“El, come on. This is ridiculous. What’s going on with you? Have I done something wrong?”

 

She looks at him, and he can see the exact moment something inside her bursts.

 

“What have you done? Are you serious? What _haven’t_ you done?” She rants at him. Dan freezes and just looks at her. “You could have anyone; do you know that? Absolutely anyone! Everyone on twitter tells you they love you, and god knows why, cos you’re just a dork with bad dress sense! But you have to have the one thing _I want_ don’t you! I can’t have anything myself, cos everyone talks about how you’ve done so much better, or done it first, and the one guy I like who I could maybe have ends up going for you instead too!”

 

It’s like everything she has ever wanted to say just spills out of her lips and she just rails at him about how she has always been second best, and how he has ruined her life. Dan lets her vent for a while, knowing that she needs to get it out of her system, and finally she quietens down, just sobbing in the corner of the sofa.

 

He stays sitting in his corner of the sofa, trying to think of something to say to her.

 

“Titch,” the old nickname just slipping out of his mouth. “I’m sorry that you feel like this…I really am,” he tries to make her feel better. “I don’t know what you want me to say…”

 

“Nothing. But having to be faced with the man you love and your brother getting it on with absolutely no prior warning and then being subjected to it every waking minute is just too much!”

 

Dan looks at her and isn’t too sure what she means by that. OK, he wasn’t subtle on stage – understatement of the year – but he hasn’t seen her at all so he doesn’t understand how she’s been subjected to it. As if she can read what he’s thinking, she huffs out a frustrated sigh and pushes her own phone towards him. He picks up the purple glittered cover from her and looks at the screen.

 

He recognises the app as being twitter, and as he’s scrolling through he recognises the same hashtag in each post. She was clearly scrolling through all of the posts under this one tag.

 

It had started on the Sunday after the gig and he can see the photos of him kissing Kyle on stage. Then there’s photos he hadn’t realised that had been taken of him; ones of them afterwards, and then in the hotel. Some of them getting out of the minibus at the studio and them of him and Kyle eating before the club. The photo taken by a fan of them both at the club together, and then from Wagamama’s at lunch time. The most recent one was of the two of them kissing in the station just before Ella had arrived.

 

There was silence as he handed the phone back to his sister.

 

“I didn’t know you had feelings for Ky, Ella.” Is all he says eventually.

 

“Would it have mattered if you did?” She asks back, and Dan can’t say anything, because no, it wouldn’t have changed anything. She was far too young for Kyle anyway. “Didn’t think so. Anyway, I didn’t know you were gay.” She adds, and Dan concedes that to her.

 

“Oh, and just so you know, I’m not staying with you this weekend. I can’t handle it. I asked you not to see him this weekend and he was with you 5 minutes before I got there.” Dan looks at her and was about to ask where she was going to stay, before she manages to mind read again and simply say, “I’m going to stay at Sharon’s.”

 

“She’s still up here?” Dan asks her. Ella nods.

 

“She’s still in that hotel for another couple of weeks I think. So, I’ll be there. If you care.” And there’s a knock on the door of his flat.

 

Dan looks around and gets off of the sofa to answer the door. Standing in the doorway is Charlie and his girlfriend, as if the whole thing had been planned. Charlie gives Dan a sad look as if he knows exactly what’s going on between him and his sister.

 

“Hey Dan,” Sharon says softly behind the bearded man.

 

Dan just holds the door open for the couple and looks at Ella and nods.

 

“Alright. But I want to speak to you tomorrow OK…this isn’t over titch alright?” He demands from his sister. Ella just snorts and picks her phone and bag up before heading out to the hall with her friend.

 

“Charlie,” Dan says before the other man can head out. Charlie stops and looks at the singer. “Make sure she’s OK tonight yeah?”

 

“Course, man. Ring me if you want updates alright. We’ll get her to you tomorrow so you can chat again.” And he heads out behind them.

 

Dan falls back into his sofa again and rests his head back against the back of it. He can’t decide whether to laugh or cry in that moment. The whole thing was so bizarre.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys. So please bear with me all this set up! More action will happen soon!!
> 
> Hope you're all still with me....Kudos and good/bad comments always welcome and needed. 
> 
> x


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OK dudes, so this is a slightly shorter chapter today.
> 
> Please enjoy!

Chapter Five

Charlie and Sharon get Ella back to the Premier Inn quickly, but there is very little conversation in the journey. She throws her stuff in the corner of the room and throws herself down on the purple sofa bed and screams loudly into the cushion on it.

 

The couple look at the young woman and then at each other, and make a silent decision to leave Sharon with her friend for the evening. She walks her boyfriend to the door and says goodbye to him with a soft kiss, confirming that she would text him later and let him know if she needed him for anything.

 

The blonde turns back round to her friend to decide what to do next. She had been friends with Ella for over a year now and she really was fond of the feisty girl, even though she was younger than her. It had really been difficult for her to be the devious woman she had been the previous month and she was still angry with her mother for making her do that. She hadn’t told Ella anything about what had happened between herself and her brother, and she was determined to leave it that way. She was in love with a wonderful man who had helped her accept her circumstances and things with the band now seemed to be on an even keel.

 

Ella had confided in her 6 months previously that she had a crush on the keyboard player. Not knowing the man or the group dynamic between Kyle and Dan, she had encouraged Ella to pursue her feelings, and when the gig was set up at the school they had both planned how she would get the older man to notice her. Now, though, what with the relationship with Dan and Kyle becoming public and her new knowledge of the people involved, she can see that the whole thing would have been fruitless from the start.

 

The older girl moves over to the sofa and sits next to her friend, placing her hand on her back and rubbing it gently to try and soothe her.

 

“I don’t understand Sharon! He was texting me and everything…why did this have to happen to me?”

 

“I don’t know hun.” The girl offers. “Maybe he was trying to be nice cos you’re Dan’s sister?”

 

“But he was texting me constantly. And liking my twitter comments. And he would always text me goodnight! A guy doesn’t do that unless he’s interested!”

 

Sharon wasn’t too sure about that. She had seen Kyle texting, but not too often. And from what she knew of the man, he didn’t seem like someone who would string anyone along. But she would only get one side of the story unless she also spoke to Kyle and so she was willing to listen to her friend at the moment.

 

“Sorry,” Ella suddenly says. “I’m a really bad friend. Tell me how everything’s been with you?” She asks, trying to seem genuinely interested.

 

“Uhm, good yeah! I’m staying up here for a while to see Charlie and keep practising so it’s going really well. Sunday was amazing!” She starts to gush, and at the mention of the previous weekend, she can see hurt ghosting the teen’s face.

 

“Was it a shock? When he did that?” She asks quietly.

 

“The kiss?” Sharon asks, and Ella nods. “A bit. He hadn’t said anything to anyone about doing it. Neither one seemed to be complaining when it happened though…” and she trails off softly, trying to let her friend down gently.

 

“Come on,” Sharon says, trying to change the mood, and she pulls her iPad into her lap. “We need food, so Dominoes!”

 

\---

 

The food was delivered half an hour later and they were both attacking a large pizza with pineapple, spicy chicken and onions when there was another knock at the door. The girls both look at each other.

 

“Did they forget something do you think?” Ella asks, and Sharon just looks around to see if there was anything they hadn’t got.

 

“I don’t think so,” she says and moves over to the door and looks through the spyhole She groans when she sees who it is, but opens the door and lets the other person in anyway.

 

The woman who walks through the door comes in in a swirl of heavy perfume, stilettos and Michael Kors and is talking as soon as she sees her daughter.

 

“Sharon! Excellent, I managed to get down and come and see you finally! Your father is so protective sometimes!” she stops quickly when she notices there is another girl on the bed in front of her. “Oh! Hello Ella dear! I wasn’t expecting to see you here! Are you staying a while?”

 

“Hi, Mrs Philps,” the younger woman says shyly. “Uhm, yes, I’m up to see my brother, but we had a bit of a fight, so I’m staying here for a couple of days.”

 

At that, Margaret Philps’s eyes narrow and her eyebrows raise slightly in interest. “Oh that’s such a shame dear. I hope the argument wasn’t over anything too dire.” And at that the girl just shrugs and goes back to eat her pizza.

 

Margaret settles down on the sofa while the girls eat and watch reality television. Sharon gets a message on her phone and sees that it’s from Charlie asking her to ring, so she decides to leave the room to ring him instead of doing it in front of her mother’s prying ears and her best friend’s broken heart. Margaret watches her like a snake as she excuses herself and leaves the room, leaving just the older woman and the teen alone together.

 

There is a beat of silence before Margaret starts talking.

 

“It’s such a shame dear that you and your brother have had a fight. I remember when me and my sisters fought and I don’t think we were as close as the two of you are.”

 

The girl just chews on the side of her lower lip whilst listening to the other woman. She has always gotten on well with her friend’s mother. She was different from her own. Her own mum was nice and friendly, but she always suspected that Dan was the favourite – the one who had done everything first and she was just an afterthought.

 

“So come on dear. Please tell me what happened between you two. We don’t want you never to speak again,” the woman kindly encourages. She looks closely at the pretty girl in front of her, and she can see when she decides she’s going to let her know what’s happened.

 

“Well, I’ve been talking to Kyle for a while and thought he was interested and now it’s come out that he and Dan are together and its really hurt me.”

 

Margaret’s heart jumps immediately into her throat. It was like all of her prayers had been answered. She needed something to get to that jumped up little shit that had annoyed her so much, and this looked to be the exact thing. However, all she says is;

 

“Oh, no Ella. That’s awful! I know it was a big surprise to everyone at the concert who saw it. And don’t say anything, but I’m not too sure Kyle was very happy about it, if you know what I mean?”

 

“Really? Sharon said they were both into it…”

 

“Oh no, dear, Sharon couldn’t see very much where she was placed. I could see everything from the wings and believe me, he wasn’t happy.” The woman lies smoothly to the young girl. “And I was very surprised indeed. I knew from Dave the manager that something had been happening while they were on tour, but I know for a fact that Kyle had broken it off a few days before they went to Cornwall….no one knew why! I don’t know whether there was someone else involved…or he was talking to someone else…” and in that instant she saw the light of hope come back into Ella’s eyes.

 

“But he had broken up with Dan?” the girl has to ask for clarification. Her friend’s mother just nods enthusiastically at her. “Maybe it was for me?” She says to no one in particular, and Margaret’s mouth curls into an unpleasant smirk.

 

“Well dear, I really couldn’t say.” She says as kindly as she is able. “Would you like me to try and help you find out though?” She asks and the girl looks up into her face. “Well I helped with Sharon and her man, so maybe I can help with this?” She says, the constant lying just coming second nature to her.

 

Ella takes a moment to think about everything that she had been told. She was certain in her head that the relationship with her and Kyle had potential and she was certain that he was the man she was destined to be with. She was so angry with Dan that he had taken him away from her and now it turns out that Kyle maybe didn’t even want to be with her brother after all.

 

This woman had spent all the time with them recently and she couldn’t see why she would lie to her about anything. She takes another look at the mother figure in front of her and nods decisively that, yes, she wanted help with this.

 

“Excellent Ella!” Margaret cries. “We will get this sorted alright? Leave it to me and just do everything that I say and you’ll be together in no time!” and the woman moves over to the girl to give her a big cuddle.

 

Pulling away she looks at the girl and repositions a stray lock of dark brown hair out of her eyes.

 

“Maybe we shouldn’t tell anyone about this though until we sort it out? We don’t want anyone to think we’re causing hassle do we?” and the manipulative female’s eyes burn brightly again as Ella nods in easy agreement.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alright, so I know there is a big pineapple pizza debate, and yes I am firmly on the side of PINEAPPLE GOOD!
> 
> Premier Inns/Travel Inns are a large nationwide budget hotel chain in the UK and all rooms look exactly the same. 
> 
> Don't think theres anything else, but if there is please let me know!!
> 
> As always, Kudos and Comments greatly appreciated and welcome.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter Six

Kyle gets back to his place and throws his bag and jacket onto the sofa while he heads into the kitchen to get something to drink. He pulls open the door of his fridge and stares at the frankly disappointing array of food inside. Running his hands through his hair and dragging them down through his beard he realises he actually doesn’t know what he’s looking for.

 

It had been so long since he had been away from other people and not worrying about things, that he was actually feeling very bored. He slams the door of the fridge shut and looks at the random assortment of things stuck to the front of his fridge with magnets. He sees the smiling face of Dan staring back at him from when they were doing T in the Park in Scotland a few years previously and he smiles to himself. He knew he wasn’t going to be seeing or hearing from the man any time soon so he wanders around his flat a bit longer deciding what to do.

 

“What do you think I should do?” He asks the plant when he passes it. Obviously not getting a response he gives it the finger and says, “well you’re a fat lot of good aren’t you!”

 

He slumps into his sofa and pulls his phone out of his pocket. Deciding he was far too hyped up to sit in and do nothing all evening, he opens a message and sends it to nearly everyone in his phone book.

 

_Kyle – Drinks, 7pm, normal place_

 

He knew anyone who mattered would know where that was and anyone else could either find out or not bother turning up. Happy he had made a decision and looking at the time, he decides to go and get ready.

 

Showering and changing into boot cut jeans and a black NASA t-shirt that he had lying around, he looks in the mirror to make sure he looked alright and headed out to his local pub three streets over.

 

By the time he got there a few of his friends had already beaten him in and he found them at the large table they usually occupied on these nights. He got himself a pint from the bar and walked over saying hi to them all when he got there.

 

“Kyle! You finally got here then!” One of the other men says to him. The man’s name was Wayne and they had known each other for a couple of years, after they met by chance at another bar.  He was older than most of the other people there and he was happily married with a family, but he always seemed to jump at the chance to get away from them for the evening.

 

“Hey Wayne, how’re the family?” Kyle asks, conversationally while taking a long gulp from his pint glass. “They let you out to play did they?” he jokes with the man.

 

The older man sarcastically laughs with him and gives him a crude gesture, to which Kyle laughs at and sits himself down in the well-used bar chair. He looks over his shoulder at some movement behind him and he smiles when he sees Will walking towards him. The bass player claps him on the shoulder and collapses in the chair next to him.

 

“Hey man! Didn’t think you’d want to come out tonight?” Kyle asks him. Will just nods at him.

 

“Yeah, she’s out with friends too so I thought it was better than lounging around on my own. Wood might come later, but he’s watching the football.” Kyle just nods at him. “What are you doing with all this anyway? You not wanting to spend some private alone time?” Will asks, innuendo thick in his question.

 

Wayne looks up at that. “What’s that? Kyle you got a bird?”

 

“Not a bird mate, no.” Kyle replies quickly, and turns back to face Will. “Ella’s in town for the weekend, and my presence is not required at the moment apparently,” and he takes another drink.

 

“Ah, family bonding time.” Will says knowingly.

 

“Something like that. Apparently the theory is she has a crush on me, and she is not currently wanting to be around me.” Kyle replies, scoffing at the thought, and Will laughs loudly at the idea.

 

They all settle down and start talking about what everyone had missed while the band had been out of the country. The good thing about the crowd was that while they all knew Will and Kyle were in a band, they weren’t focused on that and they could behave normally when they were around them. Also, none of them were really into tabloids or twitter so Kyle didn’t seem to have any awkward conversations to face about him and Dan at that moment, and he was happy that he didn’t have to field any questions alone.

 

After about an hour and another pint, Charlie joins them as if from nowhere. Kyle gets another pat on the shoulder and when he looks up he sees the younger man standing behind him.

 

“Charles! My man! Alone as well I see…come on sit down and grab a drink.”

 

“Yeah, yeah, Kyle in a minute. Can we talk outside?” He says soberly.

 

“Oh fuck. What the fucking fuck is wrong now?” He asks, seriously getting annoyed with the disproportionate amount of bad luck he seemed to be getting these days. He stands up and heads towards the front door with Charlie, patting his pockets as he went to make sure he at least had a fag and a lighter on him.

 

They get to the door and move into the smokers area which was covered in an awning to provide shelter should it start to rain. Charlie waits a few moments while Kyle slips the cigarette into his mouth, lights the tip and drags in his first breath. As he exhales, he gives a small hand motion as if to tell the other man to get on with it.

 

“Are you wearing Dan’s t-shirt?” Charlie starts by asking. Not expecting this to be the opening question, Kyle looks down to his shirt to double check.

 

“No. We all got these remember.” He replies slowly, as if the man had started to go senile.

 

“No, I know that.” Charlie says. “But wasn’t yours blue?” Kyle stops quickly and thinks hard. Mentally face palming he realises that they had obviously swapped shirts without realising it.

 

“Oh well. It fits.” Is all he says. Then almost as if he’s realising for the first time, “I have like double the amount of shirts to choose from now…” He wasn’t keen on the constant black look, but seriously this was going to come in very handy for him.

 

“Alright, alright Alexander McQueen,” Charlie says, trying to break Kyle out of his inner monologue on clothes. “There was actually a reason I came – despite the fact you left me out of your group text…” he adds accusingly.

 

“I didn’t, did I?” and he pulls his phone out to make sure he hadn’t left one of his good friends out of his night out plans. Scrolling through the names he realises he had in fact left Charlie out of the invite and he started to feel guilty. “Oh, shit man I’m sorry…” but before he was able to say anything else Charlie interrupts him.

 

“Oh my god Kyle! _Shut up!_ How does Dan put up with you? You’ve got like a 10 second attention span.” Kyle looks shocked for a moment and then just shrugs and accepts the comment. It wouldn’t be the first or last time anyone had told him that.

 

“So, what’s up then Charlie?” Kyle asks, relaxing into one of the free stools nearby. Charlie follows and sits down opposite him.

 

“Dan and Ella had a row and Ella is now staying with Sharon.” Charlie finally says.

 

“God.” Kyle says. “That sucks. I should really ring Dan, make sure he’s OK.”

 

“Yeah, that’s probably a good idea.” Charlie agrees. “But first, I’ve had a talk with Sharon and apparently Ella is certain that you were planning on pursuing something with her. She says that you were really interested in texting with her, and this is why she’s so angry with Dan.” He looks at the man as he says this to try and see any signs of guilt. He didn’t want to believe that he had done anything wrong, but he had promised his girlfriend that he would at least find out whether Ella had been seeing more than was there.

 

“What? Are you serious? She’s Dan’s sister number one and number two she’s only 15! I am like nearly double her age…No man, just no.” Kyle vehemently denies.

 

“Can I see the texts?” Charlie asks. He wasn’t expecting him to agree, but he wanted to know he had asked anyway. Kyle gives him a shocked look, but after all the crazy shit he had been through recently he was more than willing to prove anything to anyone. He gets his phone out, unlocks it with his thumb and opens the text thread he had with the young girl. He slides the phone over to the other man.

 

The whole thread started on the evening of the school gig, and seemed to carry on quite extensively until the Sunday of the Cornwall gig.

 

_Ella – Hi Kyle, this is Ella! Let me know you got this._

_Kyle – Hi girl! Yup message received._

_==_

_Ella – I just wanted you to know that I think after my brother you are like the most talented person in the band._

_Kyle – Awwwwww. That’s sweet, thank you._

_Ella – np. It’s so quiet now you’re all gone. We’re going to the cinema tonight._

_==_

_Ella – hope all the rehearsing is going well. You need to get some beauty sleep too remember x_

_Kyle – don’t need beauty sleep. It comes naturally just like to you! Sleep well x_

_==_

_Ella – there’s rumours about you and Dan fighting, hope everything is ok xx_

_Kyle – everything is fine. No worries here. How are things with you?_

_Ella – missing the banter. Everything is too quiet. Wish you were here cos youre the only one who talks to me. Xx_

_Kyle – Oh im sure that’s not true. There must be millions of people and friends you can talk to._

_Ella – not really. Everyone thinks I’m ugly and a nerd. Xx_

_Kyle – you look just like a female version of Dan and no one thinks he’s ugly. You’re hot girl. Get used to it. Any guy would be lucky to have you. Xx_

_==_

_Ella – hope your gig goes well today! Xx_

And that’s where the messages abruptly stop. Charlie thinks that’s obviously where she saw the footage from the gig. He can’t see anything that would overtly scream that Kyle was praying on the girl though, apart from some harmless talk to build her morale up. Obviously Ella had been reading too much into things.

 

“Alright man. Cool. I just wanted you to know alright?” And Kyle nods slowly at him, as he gets up and heads back into the pub.

 

Slowly he releases the breath he had been holding and thanks a God he doesn’t really believe in that Charlie hadn’t probed too much further or he would have seen a lot more than he would have liked.

 

\---

 

Dan gets a knock to the door at about 9:30 that same night and he crosses over to the door to see who it is. As he opens it he smiles widely and brightly to see Kyle standing there. He smelt of stale cigarette smoke and faintly like beer, so he knew he had been out that evening.

 

“Hey!” he greets him and pulls him forward by the hips to press and soft kiss to his lips.

 

“So, I’ve seen Charlie and he told me you and Ella fell out.” Kyle says without any preamble.

 

Dan nods at him, a bit surprised at the antsy way Kyle is behaving around him.

 

“Well, I showed Charlie the _text_ messages that Ella sent me, to prove to him that I hadn’t led her on in any way,”

 

“I never thought you had Ky, she’s just a teenager with a crush.” Dan interrupts, but the look on Kyle’s face makes him stop. “What did you do?” he suddenly says sternly.

 

“I told her she was beautiful and she may have started to send me suggestive photographs.” He says quietly.

 

Dan can’t get any words out of his mouth. He just stares open mouthed at his boyfriend as if he was trying to catch flies or something.

 

“Dan, that sounds so much worse than it actually is!” Kyle tries to backtrack. “She was feeling insecure one day so I sent her these messages,” and Kyle shows Dan the same messages he had shown Charlie. “So every morning she would then send me a selfie to ask me how she was looking that day. As the days went on her tops were getting lower and lower and the looks on her face were becoming sexier and sexier. I swear I just wrote back she looked good and then deleted the photos. Look, you can look through my phone, there’ s nothing there at all. You can read every conversation and nothing! Please you have to believe me that I didn’t encourage or follow through with anything…” Kyle’s rambling now, desperately trying to get the other man to believe everything he is saying.

 

It is so sincere and heartfelt that Dan can’t help but believe him and he strides forward and crashes his own lips upon the bearded face of the other man to stop him from talking. The kiss starts out rough and hard, but soon morphs into a gentle and reassuring sign of acceptance and Kyle soon sighs into it at Dan pulls away before he takes more.

 

“You believe me?” Is all Kyle can ask.

 

“You fucking idiot, of course I believe you!” Dan replies and throws himself forward for another kiss.

 

\---

 

Elsewhere in the city, in a budget hotel room just a 15-year-old and her best friend’s mother are talking quietly as the friend goes out to take another phone call.

 

“So Ella,” the older woman says. “Where are these photos you mentioned?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again for reading. Hope you're still enjoying x


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the brief break and unreliable updates! Am off this week so probably a lot more coming.  
> Please enjoy x

Chapter Seven

Dan pulls Kyle over to the sofa for them to become more comfortable and relax after Kyle’s confessions about his sister. The younger man settles himself in the corner of the sofa and Dan cuddles in at his side and pulls Kyle’s arm around his shoulders so that they can be as close as possible. Kyle rests his bearded chin on Dan’s head and he feels a great weight has been lifted off of him.

 

“Do you want to see the texts?” Kyle asks him slowly, unsure whether this will just open a huge can of worms that will add insult to injury.

 

“Yeah, if you want to show me?” Dan replies, and takes the phone when it’s offered to him. He slowly flicks through them and he can see the way that Ella is trying to subtly flirt with his partner as the texts go on. He sees Kyle’s attempts at being kind back, but he can see how it may be taken the other way also. He just sighs loudly and hands the phone back to the other man.

 

He tilts his head backwards to look at Kyle’s face and sees concern in his eyes.

 

“Ky, don’t worry, its fine. Just wondering when we all time travelled back to high school,” and he chuckles to himself.

 

“Don’t say that, I was a mess in high school.” Kyle groans, and Dan just raises his eyebrow at him.

 

“Dude, I was a dork and unpopular in high school,” Dan replies.

 

“Dude, you’re still a dork,” Kyle retorts and kisses the top of his head. “But you’re my dork,” and he scratches the singer behind his ear and the back of his head like he would a cat.

 

“Not a cat Kyle…”

 

“Sorry, just miss them still.” He says sadly. “My sister’s got them til we finish the summer,” and Dan hugs him harder.

 

“Game of Thrones or Twin Peaks?” Dan suddenly asks to change the subject and stop the moping.

 

“You have to ask?” Kyle says. “Thronecast, now!” he says, avoiding the bitch glare Dan throws at him for studiously ignoring his favourite programme.

 

\---

 

They get through about 25 minutes of the programme until Kyle slowly lies Dan backwards on the couch and crawls on top of him. He is clearly bored and wants to focus on something else, so he brackets Dan’s face with his elbows and starts to stoke the longer, wayward strands of hair from the man’s face and pushes them behind his ears. He runs his thumbs along Dan’s eyebrows and down the side of his face as if he is trying to map the contours of his face for posterity and leans in to gently kiss the tip of his nose and then the side of his mouth. His hand travels further south until it is gently pressing against the space between Dan’s neck and shoulder and he keeps it there as he presses soft kisses to his lips.

 

Dan’s spine is tingling as soon as the movement in their position takes place and he can’t do anything but be enthralled with the movement of his partner’s movements. As soon as Kyle makes any moves on him he is done for and it’s been this way ever since they eventually got together a matter of months previously. He doesn’t care what happens next, he just knows that he will now lose all ability to think until it’s over. He feels the smooth metal of Kyle’s thumb ring slide against the side of his face and after the first soft kiss on his lips, he slightly parts them in preparation for more.

 

‘More’ comes quickly when Kyle moves forward again to trap his waiting lips with his own, and as he tries to pull back Dan chases them to bring them back down to him. The kiss, which Kyle intended on becoming merely a make out session for them both, soon descends into a much dirtier experience. Dan can taste the faint hint of cigarettes on his boyfriend and the sourness of beer mingling with it, and the fact that this is on Kyle is not putting him off, but instead turning him on and he bucks his hips to grind against the lower body of the other man.

 

Kyle jerks his head on the movement and moves it to Dan’s neck and bites down, causing a growl to come from him as he starts to grind his hips back in kind. Movements becoming more urgent as the men become more aroused by each other, Dan moves his hands to Kyle’s t-shirt and pulls it up at the back to feel more skin. He can feel the faint slick of sweat beading on Kyle’s back and he hikes the hem up further to see if Kyle will get the message and remove it.

 

His plan works and they’re soon separating for the briefest of seconds to throw away the offending article of clothing. Dan runs his hands down Kyle’s back and across his hips to rub the muscles he finds in his partners abdomen, and running his fingers lower he starts to unbuckle Kyle’s belt and unbutton his jeans. Realising what is happening, Kyle quickly gets with the programme and pulls down the tracksuit bottoms of the older man to get access to his fully hard erection.

 

Dan pushes Kyle’s jeans and boxers so they are free of his perfectly pert ass and grabs onto the muscles there firmly as he runs his hands back up. Neither man wanting to move from their current position, Kyle makes a decision and brings his hand up to Dan’s mouth, and Dan knows exactly what he’s thinking. He sticks his tongue out and licks a long, wet stripe against the large hand presented to him. He throws his head back against the arm of the couch and waits.

 

Kyle moves his hand down to their waiting cocks, leaking precome and waiting for attention. His large hands and fingers deftly moving around both of them and gradually increasing speed and friction. The air is punctuated with cries of ‘fuck, yeah,’ ‘Christ,’ and the other man’s names as the panting and moaning get louder.

 

Kyle uses his other hand to raise Dan’s own t-shirt from his stomach in preparation for the eventual aftermath and he squeezes both dicks ever so slightly, and twists his wrist as he reaches the heads of both men. White heat starts to spark at the base of Kyle’s spine and he can feel his excitement beginning to mount.

 

“God, Dan, I’m so close…” he manages to pant out, and Dan can only nod to him – his head still thrown back, mouth hanging open and eyes squeezed tightly shut.

 

“God, Dan, please.” Kyle pants, “Come for me Dan…” and before the words are even out of the man’s mouth, Dan spills all over Kyle’s hand with a long groan. Using the heat and wetness covering his hand for more lubrication, Kyle quickens his pace and lasts only another 30 seconds before coming as well, with a loud noise sounding remarkably like Dan’s name.

 

Collapsing on top of him, Kyle starts trying to catch his breath as he looks up at the beautiful post orgasmic face of his lover. Dan’s eyes still closed and breathing evening out, he decides that cleaning up can wait a bit longer and he shuts his own eyes to get his own energy back.

 

\---

 

Waking up to his doorbell, Dan jerks forward and blearily looks around his bedroom. He can faintly remember dragging both of their asses to bed after cleaning each other up, but he must have been really tired because he can’t remember anything else. He looks over at Kyle, naked and lying on his front next to him and – like the human cat he is – taking up most of the damn bed.

 

The doorbell rings again and he is reminded of what actually woke him up. He falls out of bed, puts his glasses on and pulls on his pyjamas which he hadn’t managed to get to before falling asleep and meanders wobbly towards the front door.

 

Opening the door, he’s faced with Sharon, Charlie and behind both of them, his little sister.

 

“God, Dan, please put it away – no one wants to be faced with that at this time in the morning,” Sharon jokes as she walks past him into the flat and Charlie sniggers at his girlfriend.

 

Ella walks a bit slower behind them, but does go into the flat without any objections.

 

“Uhm, guys,” Dan says quietly. “Kyle’s in the bedroom sleeping,” and this earns him a look from the two girls. Ella looks like she going to say something, but closes her mouth again as Sharon starts talking.

 

“Well, that’s what we’re here to talk about anyway.” She starts. “So Ella is ready to forgive and forget I think. She is feeling a bit silly, but…”

 

“Yeah, I’m an idiot. We got it. Now can we go and get breakfast or something?” Ella interrupts quickly. And at that moment there’s a thud from the other room and Dan can only assume it is his idiot boyfriend falling out of bed.

 

“OW!” comes a voice and Dan figure’s he’s absolutely right in his assumption.

 

“Hang on a minute,” Dan says and excuses himself as he sees Ella’s face starting to blush, realising she was about to see Kyle for the first time.

 

He strides into the bedroom and throws spare pyjamas at Kyle who is now resting with his back against the bed and massaging his elbow where he had obviously hit it as he rolled off the bed.

 

“Ella’s here. Put these on, and _be nice_.” He hisses at the man.

 

“I’m always nice,” Kyle whines back at him and slips the clothes on before following him back into the living room.

 

As he saunters in, he sees the youngest Smith standing next to the window with her back to the bedroom. He clears his throat as he enters and then heads into the adjoining kitchen to make himself a drink to wake up to.

 

“Coffee for anyone else?” He offers and everyone else apart from Dan shakes their heads. Ella turns around and looks at the keyboard player work around her brother’s kitchen to make himself a coffee and in her head she mentally drools as she sees that his shirt is still off.

 

The thoughts run through her head of what she and Margaret have planned and she tries desperately to put her GCSE Drama knowledge to work as she makes her face turn into a grimace and show embarrassment when faced with her crush.

 

Dan looks at her closely and sends her a sympathetic look as he sees her redden quickly. She ignores the look and goes back to look out of the window somewhat reluctantly.

 

“Did someone say something about breakfast?” Dan asks quickly and they all agree to head out to get something to eat.

 

\---

 

Following a quick shower for the men, and dressing even faster – Kyle now embracing his extended wardrobe and stealing Dan’s ‘To Kill a King’ t-shirt – they head out to a nearby high end bar/café that specialises in breakfast. They all sit down at a large table and wait for their food to arrive.

 

“So how are you doing Ella?” Dan eventually asks his sister, and in reply she sends a quick glance to Kyle who is playing on his phone. She looks back to her brother.

 

“I’m doing better after having a rant last night.” She says. “It’s not fair for me to judge anything you guys do together, so I’m sorry. And I do want to spend my birthday weekend with you.”

 

Dan looks at her, relieved and slightly tearful as he realises how much he hated being at odds with his sister.

 

“So, that being said,” Sharon interrupts, “Charlie has offered his place up for a small party tomorrow night? Everyone’s invited obviously and you two can go out shopping for an outfit for her birthday tomorrow?”

 

Dan nods enthusiastically and looks at his sister. “Is that alright with you?” He asks.

 

“Absolutely,” the young girl replies, smiling widely, but not for the reason she knew her brother was thinking.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OK!  
> So Thronecast is the after show of GoT over here on Sky.  
> GCSE is one set of exams.  
> Sorry if you know all this!!  
> Please leave comments and Kudos if you feel inclined. x


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OK Guys, thanks for staying with me. This is the second update for today, as of the next chapter, more action should happen. I know it's moving slowly at the moment...but I can only write what they tell me!!
> 
> Please enjoy this x

Chapter Eight

Breakfast is…pleasant. Kyle spends most of the time avoiding any kind of eye contact or speech with Ella and Dan watches Ella constantly flick her eyes to his boyfriend, even though she clearly thinks she’s being subtle. Charlie and Sharon lead the majority of the conversation and steers topics to safe ones everyone can join in with if they wanted to.

 

After the food is finished, Kyle makes his excuses and gets up to leave, throwing a twenty pound note on the table for his part of the bill. Dan watches him stand with wide eyes, and strokes his hand through his hair like he does when he gets nervous.

 

“Hang on Ky, let me walk you out,” he says quickly, not wanting the man to leave without saying goodbye. He doesn’t notice – and neither does anyone else – the eye roll coming from his sister, as if he had just said something that had confirmed all of her suspicions.

 

Dan pushes his wooden chair out from the table, scraping it obnoxiously against the painted wooden floorboards and follows Kyle out of the front door into the sunlight.

 

“Are you OK that I spend time with Ella for the next couple of days?” Dan asks, worried that Kyle is going to get upset with him.

 

“Did you seriously just ask me that?” Kyle asks incredulously. “You were going to anyway! This way I get to party with you on Saturday night!” Dan smiles at him, and Kyle pulls him towards him by the back of the neck and kisses him on the forehead. “I’ll speak to you later, alright?” he asks, and Dan nods against his lips. Kyle quickly ducks his head to peck him on the lips and then turns to head towards the closest tube station.

 

He stands outside the restaurant and watches his lover walk away before he heads back inside to the others and throws his own money down to pay for himself and his sister. Ella is on her mobile texting someone frantically when he gets back in so he just looks at her.

 

“Who’s that you’re talking to?” He asks her conversationally.

 

“Friend from school,” she says quickly, and Dan nods in understanding.

 

“So are you staying back with me now?” He asks her, and she bites her lower lip and looks up from her screen. She nods in agreement and Dan can see Sharon and Charlie physically exhale in relief from beside him. “Cool, well we can get your stuff and go and do something this afternoon if you want?” and she nods again.

 

That decided, they part ways with the couple and head back to Sharon’s hotel room with a spare key to get her back of stuff. They then head back to the flat to drop it off before sitting down to decide what they were going to do for the rest of the day.

 

“Well, there was talk of an outfit?” Ella says quietly when they’re back at the flat and Dan asks her what she wants to do. Dan rolls his eyes at her in exasperation. Shopping for girl’s clothes was the last thing he really wanted to do, but it was her birthday tomorrow and it was her 16th, so it really was the least he could do for her. He looks at the digital display on his watch and he sees its actually pretty late on now.

 

“OK, food then late night shopping alright with you?” He asks her, and her face lights up and she nods quickly. “Got anywhere in mind?” and he silently prays that it’s not anywhere in the high end fashion district. He really can’t afford a Gucci outfit for her, no matter how much he likes to make her happy.

 

“Selfridges, Top Shop, the normal.” She says to him. He signs an inward breath of relief as he realises he only has to go to Oxford Street and they head off quickly to grab food somewhere nice on the way.

 

After a quick meal, they head into the upmarket department store and have to climb the escalator to get to the third floor and the personal shopping department. As soon as Ella had even hinted that she would like to experience that perk of shopping, Dan had jumped on it as a way to get this entire trip done and dusted as quickly as possible. He _really_ was not looking forward to shopping for girls clothes.

 

They get assigned a young, slim and clearly fashion conscious girl who introduces herself as Tanya. She was blonde, with her hair around her shoulders and was wearing three quarter length tailored trousers, a white dress shirt and mules on her feet. She eyes Dan with some sort of recognition, but doesn’t say anything as Ella charges forward to introduce herself first.

 

“Hi! I’m Ella! I’m here to shop for my 16th birthday party. It’s tomorrow night and I need something really special.” She rushes out with hardly a breath between words.

 

“Alright then!” Tanya replies happily. “Is there anything you don’t want or don’t like wearing?” She asks the girl.

 

“Nothing too short, too revealing or too sexy,” Dan replies from behind them, his best ‘big brother’ voice trying to shine through. Ella scoffs and leads the retailer by the elbow further into the changing room they had use of. Dan could no longer hear what was being said, so he just hummed along with the top 40 hits being played in the background and thumbed through his phone.

 

He has a few texts from his mum after he had texted her to find out if they knew about Ella’s party. She had replied saying that she was aware of it, but that they weren’t going to be able to make it and Dan should just let her have a good time. The second message was one saying that she had booked Ella a hair and make-up appointment at an up market salon the following day and could Dan make sure she got there in time. He types out a quick reply and then sees his sister and her new friend walk back towards the room.

 

As Tanya walks in she is carrying about 5 or 6 different dresses and hangs them up on the rail in the curtained off changing area. Ella moves into the cubicle with the dresses and pulls the curtain closed to try on the dresses.

 

“Ella, I want to see them you know!” Dan calls through to her.

 

“Yeah, Yeah, Yeah,” she mutters from the other side, noises of zips being undone and clothes being thrown off come also.

 

Tanya has a quick once over of Dan as he moves to the fabric tub chairs provided for the people waiting and sits down in one. He pours himself a complimentary glass of the water sitting on the table between the chairs.

 

“You know I can offer you something stronger if you want?” Tanya almost purrs at him as she watches from her standpoint.

 

“Uhm, no its fine. I’m cool with the water.” He says and picks his phone up again.

 

“Cool phone case,” the girl tries again. “Totally retro.” She adds and Dan flips his phone over to take in his Game Boy covered iPhone.

 

“Yeah, I suppose it is now,” he answers politely and continues to try and ignore her.

 

“So your girlfriend is really pretty,” Tanya finally says after a beat of silence.

 

“Who, now?” Dan asks in disbelief, finally looking at the sales assistant, who points towards the changing room. “Oh no!” He replies quickly. “Nonono! That’s my sister!” he says, appalled at the thought. The woman smirks in triumph and starts to move toward him seductively.

 

Dan’s saved almost immediately by the sound of a curtain being pulled back and Ella walking out of the cubicle to twirl in front of him. The first dress she has tried on is a mini dress. The hem line stops just shy of her crotch and it’s made of some sort of knitted material. Finally, it looks like it is practically painted onto her body and is leopard print. Dan doesn’t have to say anything. His wide eyes, open mouth and firm shake of the head does it all for him.

 

“But Dan!” the girl cries from in front of him. “It’s a DSquared2!”

 

“Ella, you’ve known me all of your life. At what point did you think that would be an argument you could sway me with?” Dan retorts quickly. “No leopard print…I’m not that gay!”

 

Ella pouts and storms back into the changing room forcefully closing the curtain behind her. Dan classes that as a success and goes back to his phone. He realises that after the revelation of his sexuality the woman has eased off considerably, which has made things a lot more comfortable for him. He takes some photos of his surroundings and sends them to Kyle to keep him updated of his surroundings and quickly gets a message back from him.

 

_Kyle – huh, funny, I’m on Ox St too!_

_Dan – Why?_

_Kyle – That would be telling. Love u xx_

He’s broken out of his wondering by the curtain opening again and Ella walking out in yet another mini dress. This one was awfully similar to the one she wore at the school gig, but much shorter. It had the lace up detail on the side and had slightly wider straps.

 

Dan wasn’t enamoured with this one either, but it was in fact less revealing than the dress she already owned, so he could cope with it. He shrugs at her and looks at her as if to say _‘what do you think?’_

“I like it but it’s like one I already have,” she decides and heads back into the changing room.

 

The next dress that comes out is a black and blue asymmetrical lace mini dress. It wasn’t low cut which Dan could handle. It fit alright, but wasn’t the most flattering dress in the world. Ella discards this one out of hand.

 

The second to last dress was another black dress, but more flowy this time. It reminded Dan of something one of the higher end celebrities at Coachella might wear, with embroidered light blue flowers down the sides and an ease to it. He quite liked this dress, but he could tell his sister wasn’t too sure about it and that it wasn’t form fitting enough for her. SO that was another dress in the no pile.

 

Finally, she comes out in the dress she knows she has to have. When she puts it on she feels perfect in it. It’s a navy blue and black lace dress with cut outs tastefully below the bust line. The neck is cut low but there is light mesh on it so it still seems covered and the hem line is a perfect length. She swans out of the cubicle and looks at Dan with expectant eyes.

 

Dan clearly isn’t happy by this choice either, but he can’t decide whether he would be happy with anything less than a potato sack over his sister or whether he has no fashion sense at all. He just shrugs again and Ella squeals with delight when she realises that she can get the dress she loves so much.

 

“Can I get shoes as well?” She asks, cheekily. And Dan just rolls her eyes as she runs out to find the perfect pair of spaghetti sandals to go with the outfit.

 

“She’s lucky to have a brother like you,” Tanya says from beside him.

 

“Yeah, or I have the word MUG written on my forehead, one of the two.” He replies and heads out to go and find his sister. He gets out there and she is standing in the corner of the shoe department, whispering hurriedly into her phone.

 

“…so you managed to get the stuff…OK…no, I’m fine…it’s still on…I’ll see you tomorrow, bye.”

 

“Who you gonna see tomorrow?” Dan asks from behind her. Ella makes a small whimper in surprise and a small jump.

 

“For God’s sake idiot, don’t do that to me!” and she punches him in the chest. “It was Sharon! She said she had managed to get some decorations and stuff for the party tomorrow and she was making sure we were still OK.” She adds to explain herself.

 

Dan looks at her again closely and nods at her. “Alright. You chosen shoes yet?” he asks, seemingly accepting what she had said.

 

She moves over to where the shoes she likes are and exhales a big sigh of relief. Everything was going to plan and tomorrow was going to be the best night of her life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So heres the links for the different dresses mentioned if you're interested.   
> Dress 1 - http://www.selfridges.com/GB/en/cat/dsquared2-leopard-print-knitted-dress_184-84031670-S73CU0257S16044/?previewAttribute=Black%2Fbrown  
> Dress 2 - http://www.selfridges.com/GB/en/cat/dsquared2-lace-up-crepe-dress_184-84031670-S72CU0464S41833/?previewAttribute=Black  
> Dress 3 - http://www.selfridges.com/GB/en/cat/self-portrait-strike-guipure-lace-mini-dress_234-3003847-SP12003/?previewAttribute=Black  
> Dress 4 - http://www.selfridges.com/GB/en/cat/free-people-cora-floral-embroidered-woven-mini-dress_137-3003213-OB600169/?previewAttribute=Black  
> Dress 5 - http://www.selfridges.com/GB/en/cat/topshop-mesh-insert-lace-dress_716-10078-35L11LNAV/?previewAttribute=Navy+blue
> 
> Hope you enjoyed guys. Please leave Kudos and any comments, good or bad xx


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi guys. A bit of a longer chapter tonight. Hope it's alright for you all x

Chapter Nine

After Dan’s wallet became about £300 lighter, the siblings make it home in good time that night. Carrying all of the purchases himself into the small flat and dumping them next to his sister’s bags, he then goes and pulls the spare duvet and pillows out and throws them on the couch for her. She rushes into the bathroom so that she can start what Dan calls her ‘night time beauty regime’ and he heads into the bedroom and changes into pyjamas and a t-shirt he can relax in.

 

“What do you actually do in there for all that time?” He calls through to her, listening to water running and things being moved around in the bathroom.

 

“I refuse to answer that question when it comes from a man who uses an entire tub of gel on his hair before going anywhere!” she retorts and he laughs at her.

 

They reconvene after about half an hour into the living room to relax in front of the television. Ella reaches for the remote control after collapsing full length on the sofa and pulling the duvet around her to keep warm. Dan sits on the floor with his back to the sofa which is where he usually ends up on these nights.

 

“What are we watching?” He asks his sister as he watches her flick through all the box sets on offer before settling on one.

 

“Teen Mom,” she replies and Dan tips his head back to look up at her.

 

“Seriously?” He asks he and she just nods with a smile.

 

“Fine. But I better not know any of their names by the time I go to bed…”

 

\---

 

Dan knows all of their names and entire backstory by the time he goes to bed that night. In fact, he is so hooked he has also started watching Teen Mom 2 and gets just as outraged as Ella when things happen to them.

 

It’s a late night for both of them, but Dan goes to sleep knowing that their relationship is much better than it had been that morning.

 

\---

 

The following day leading up to the evening actually goes pretty quickly for everyone. Ella had an appointment with her ‘stylist’ that afternoon and everyone was meeting up for the party for 7:30 that evening.

 

Ella’s primary mission for the morning was to get Dan’s outfit sorted.

 

“You are not going to my party in jeans and a t-shirt Dan,” were the exact words she used, so that led to them both in the bedroom, Dan sitting on the bed, watching his little sister pull all of the clothes he owns out to see if they were suitable.

 

“Can I at least wear jeans?” the man eventually asks her, and considering it was either jeans, embarrassing shorts from 4 years ago or a suit she does reluctantly agree that he is able to wear his skinny jeans.

 

“Seriously, bro, do you own any colours?”

 

“I look good in black, OK?” He replies exasperatedly, his good nature slowly starting to seep away with the constant criticism of his wardrobe.

 

“Fantastic! Found something!” Ella suddenly proclaims and she looks at the hanger close up to make sure that the piece of clothing is clean and smart enough. She’s found a short sleeved grey linen shirt that Dan had bought to wear to some awards show a year or so ago. “Does this still fit?” She asks him critically.

 

“Of course it does! God sake Ella, I’ve been this weight for years!” he responds angrily and grabs the shirt from her. “Fine, I’ll wear this. Does everyone else know there’s a dress code?”

 

“Well everyone who isn’t a college kid in a grown-ups body, yeah.” Ella replies snarkily and Dan sticks his tongue out at her.

 

“I better tell Kyle then,” Dan mumbles quietly, and pulls his mobile out to text him while Ella makes sure there nothing else better for him to wear. He realises he has a message from Charlie, so he updates his boyfriend with the dress code and looks into the message.

 

_Charlie – change of venue tonight. My place is too small. Heading to Dave’s for 7:30_

Dan groans loudly but shoves his phone back into his pocket and tells his sister it’s time to get her to the hair salon.

 

\---

 

The two of them get a taxi to Dave’s flat and they arrive fashionably late at 8pm that evening. Dan can understand why having a largish party full of musicians at Dave’s house is probably the best idea, but this man is one of the last people Dan wants to mix with on a social level after the crap he pulled between him and Kyle.

 

The manager lives in a large upscale apartment block on the river Thames and is one of the most prestigious addresses in the city. He had managed to snag the penthouse suite and this consisted of two levels, an outside balcony and garden terrace on the top floor and extensive open plan living room. He had fantastic views across the river and he could imagine this would at least be a special venue for his little sister’s 16th birthday.

 

He waits for her as she gets out of the back of the black cab, teetering on possibly slightly too high heels and wearing her new beloved dress. Dan is wearing the shirt Ella had chosen for him, jeans and a pair of greyish blue converse he had found that went well with the colour of his shirt.

 

They press the buzzer for the penthouse and the door is immediately opened for them with no need to say who they were. They head in and get the lift up to the top floor and are let out into a large vestibule area leading up to the only door on the floor. They can hear loud music and noise coming from inside the flat, but they knock on the door and it’s immediately opened by none other than Margaret Philps.

 

“Ella! So good to see you!” she exclaims when she sees the birthday girl. She throws a disdainful glance at her brother standing next to her. “Dan.”

 

“Margaret, what are you doing here? I really didn’t think this would be your idea of a good time.” Dan says acidly and pushes past the woman to enter the flat.

 

“Your parents asked if I could keep an eye on things,” she replies smoothly and he sees her flick a look towards Ella. “So everything is going on upstairs!” she says excitedly to the young girl. “Come on, let’s get you up there to see your friends!” and she pulls the girl up the spiral staircase to get to the large entertaining space.

 

Dan follows them upstairs and as soon as he gets up there, he notices that Charlie and Sharon have done a fantastic job at organising things at such short notice. The area seemed filled with people that Ella seemed to know from school. There were decorations and balloons tastefully put up all over the room. Outside there were lit torches set up to light up the entire roof terrace. There was a makeshift stage with some instruments sitting there and Dan could see his friends out there milling around. He overhears Margaret tell Ella that the kitchen was fully stocked with drinks of all kinds, so he heads immediately to the kitchen to pick up something to drink.

 

Getting to the kitchen island and pulling a plastic cup off of the pile waiting there, he suddenly sees Dave looking at him from the other side of the room.

 

“Evening Dave,” he says and nod his head in greeting.

 

“Dan.” The man says coldly. “I take it everything is OK for you going away next week?”

 

“As far as I’m aware Dave. No problems that I’ve come up with anyway. Anything you want to try and start now or…?” He says sarcastically and watches the other man get red again. He finishes pouring himself Vodka and Lemonade and heads away from him to find more exciting people.

 

He doesn’t bump into anyone else he knows, so he eventually ends up on the roof terrace with people he knows and likes. Kyle, Woody, Will and Charlie are all hanging around the stage area and have managed to snag some garden furniture to lean on as well. As soon as Dan sees Kyle though, everyone else disappears and he just hones in on the man like a homing missile.

 

Kyle had clearly gotten Dan’s message about the dress code even though he hadn’t replied to the message. He was wearing what seemed to be new black jeans, but he had a teal blue short sleeved shirt on, buttoned all the way to the top and was wearing black dress shoes.

 

Dan reaches him and curls his arm around his waist while he isn’t looking. He can feel him jump very slightly in surprise, but when he turns his gaze to see who it is, his face immediately softens and smiles brightly at him.

 

“Hey! I was gonna text you and find out where you were!” Kyle says happily and bends his head to softly kiss the other man.

 

“Ella was apparently entitled to be late to her own party.” Dan explains and relaxes into Kyle’s arm going around his shoulders to hold him closer. “So why is there a stage and instruments?” He asks everyone else.

 

“Well, apparently,” Woody starts, “There’s two hats. One with a whole load of songs and one with the names of everyone here and they’re gonna pull a name and a song out and they have to sing it.”

 

“And who exactly is going to be playing this music?” Dan asks, dreading the answer.

 

“Well, I made the list of the songs, and I know what you can all play so you guys will be!” comes a voice from behind him. Dan looks round into the smiling face of Coop and he can feel that his face has morphed into looking pissed off.

 

“You utter bastard Cooper,” Dan says. “What the hell are you doing here anyway?” he says after hitting him in the chest for his betrayal.

 

“Charlie asked me to DJ.” He laughs at the feeble attempt of the singer to intimidate him, and Dan rolls his eyes at him.

 

Kyle hugs him tighter as he laughs as well, and Dan starts to drink his alcohol a little bit faster. Dan had had problems with anxiety since his high school days, and even though touring and performing had helped some way to cure this, he still had a lot of performance fear when doing anything different that he hadn’t practiced numerous times before. This is why all the speaking he did at concerts all seemed to be exactly the same. He had a script and he stuck to it. This helped with his panic. Tonight, though, he may need a bit more liquid courage to get through it.

 

“Are you OK?” Kyle asks him in his ear, and Dan just nods, not trusting his voice. “Can we go and chat for a minute?” and Dan looks at his face and nods again.

 

Kyle grabs him by the hand and threads their fingers together. He drags them inside and he avoids milling teenagers in the large living area and pulls hi back down the stairs to the quieter rooms. Opening one of the closed doors, they find themselves in a large guest bedroom, the bed covered in coats of the partygoers upstairs. Kyle lets Dan go into the room first and then follows afterwards, closing the door quietly behind them.

 

“Ky? What’s happened?” Dan asks, suspicious and worried at the same time. Kyle doesn’t immediately reply, but he places his hands on Dan’s hips and guides him towards the end of the bed and pushes him until he sits down.

 

“Dan…” Kyle starts.

 

“Oh God, Kyle, this isn’t another one of those talks is it?” and Dan’s eyes go very wide and his brow furrows deeper as he starts to panic.

 

“No Dan! God, no! Please let me say what I need to say OK?” Kyle crouches down in front of the other man and grabs his hands in both of his and squeezes hard. “OK, Dan. I never thought when you badgered me into joining this crazy life that you would have ended up one of my best friends. Not only my best friend, but the most amazing part of my life. I am so happy we both got our fingers out of our asses and did something about this between us this year. I know it’s not been long and we have so much we have to do before we get more serious. But…” he pauses to take a breath. “I know what I want and I know I won’t ever want anyone else.” He stops again and he pulls something out of his pocket. “This isn’t a proposal, cos that’s far too soon. But this is a promise. It’s a promise that I’m not going anywhere, that I’ll love you forever and that when the time is right I will ask you to marry me.” He pulls the lid off of the box he holds in his hands and Dan does actually gasp in spite himself.

 

Inside is a black brushed metal ring. There is the slightest curve on the edge, but it is definitely made for a man. There is a groove right in the centre of the band and inside there is a vibrant blue line through it. Dan picks the ring up out of the box and caresses the metal with his fingers. He flips it over and inside the band he can see an engraving:

 

_K.J.S + D.C.S_

When he realises it’s their initials, he licks along his bottom lip and bites down on it. He looks up directly into Kyle’s eyes and just stares lovingly at him.

 

“Dan?” Kyle asks, “What are you thinking?”

 

There’s more silence for a few beats while Dan just continues to look at him. He sees that the younger man is starting to get very frustrated by this point and his face breaks into a beaming grin.

 

“So which finger do I put this on then?” Is all he says to him. At that Kyle’s face morphs into shock and then happiness as he surges forward to throw his hands around Dan’s neck and kiss him for all he was worth. He pulls away and takes the ring from the singer and slides it onto the middle finger of his left hand. Dan holds his hand out to admire it with shock, and then stands and pulls his partner into a huge crushing hug, until Kyle has to tap out as he can no longer breathe.

 

\---

The lovers finally emerge from the spare bedroom after another half an hour and head back up to join the party. They both needed more drinks so they head to the kitchen for refills while still holding hands.

 

“There you guys are!” Coop shouts from the living room. “C’mon we’re doing this karaoke thing.” And both the men voice their disapproval at the idea. “It’s your sister’s birthday Dan, come on!” and he disappears off outside to grab a mike and get everyone to congregate around the stage area.

 

Once they were out there, Coop explains the rules and what will happen. All the kids seem excited about the idea, but before anything can happen Ella grabs the microphone and announces there would be _‘absolutely no Bastille’_ on pain of death.

 

“Thanks sis,” Dan comments as she gets off the stage next to him.

 

“No hard feelings Danno, but I’m sick of your songs!” and she heads back to her friends.

 

“OK!” Coop says. “The first song is………Africa, by Toto!” and most of the kids look around and have no idea what the song is. Kyle already knows he’s going up to play the keyboards on this. As it’s an 80’s song, he is the one most likely to know the music. “The singer is our very own…. Charlie Barnes!”

 

Kyle, Woody and Charlie all take the stage. It’s actually a pretty good choice for Charlie due to his extensive range so the song goes well for them all. Kyle knows the music by heart and Woody manages to keep the beat as they go. By the end of the song they’re all harmonising with the man and it sounds pretty awesome to Dan. The kids agree and there’s a huge round of applause when they finish.

 

The following songs include an awful rendition of Breakeven by the Script by one of Ella’s school friends; Something Like This by Dan and Stitches by Sharon. Finally, Ella is called on stage and she decides that the song she would like to sing is Every Time We Touch by Cascada.

 

Before she gets on the small stage, she gets Kyle and Dan a drink from the kitchen to thank them for playing for them as it is mainly a dance song, so the majority of the music comes from synths. They happily take the drinks from her and because this is one of many for Kyle, he downs nearly the entire drink before he heads behind his keyboard.

 

She starts to sing to the song and she starts dancing at the same time. Ella has not been blessed with as good a singing voice as Dan, so she tries to make up for it with enthusiasm and she dances provocatively and close to the boys in the front of the crowd and then also with Kyle as he plays the musical interludes.

 

As the song finishes there is more clapping and applause for the birthday girl and Coop starts the music again and people start to dance out on the rooftop. By this time, it is getting late, but the party shows no signs of stopping.

 

Kyle and Dan who haven’t separated all night manage to get lost in the crowd and the dancing continues into the small hours of the morning.

 

\---

 

The following morning, Kyle opens his eyes and he has the worst headache he has had for a number of years. He usually handles his hangovers well, but he has obviously woken up far too early or he didn’t drink enough water before falling into bed the previous night.

 

He looks around and doesn’t recognise the bed he is lying in. He kind of recognises the room as the one he and Dan had spent time in the previous night, so he can only assume that they had been far too drunk to get home and they had crashed at Dave.

 

He turns over to try and find his phone, but it’s not next to him where he would normally expect to find it. He throws his hand over to his other side to hit Dan and find out where he’s put it and he hits something solid.

 

“Dan? Have you got my phone?” he asks and throws his arm down again. He still gets no response from the man, so he shifts in the bed to pull the duvet down and get him to wake up.

 

As he turns over and moves the covers, he suddenly realises that something is wrong. The person next to him is naked, yes, and has exactly the same colour of hair as his partner. But as he moves closer, he realises the hair is too long. And the skin is too soft. The person shifts slightly in position and it’s at that exact second he realises that the naked person next to him is none other than Ella.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OK! So a bit of excitement for you. 
> 
> Here's some links if you want to look:
> 
> Dan's ring - http://weddbook.com/media/2513879/tungsten-wedding-band-two-tone-8mm-black-mens-ring-center-blue-groove-flat-edge-comfort-fit
> 
> Africa by Toto - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FTQbiNvZqaY
> 
> Every Time We Touch by Cascada - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4G6QDNC4jPs
> 
> Breakeven - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MzCLLHscMOw


	10. Interlude

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OK guys. So this is a tiny wee chapter with some of what happened in the last one as a recap. It's more of a bridge into the next part of the story. Alluding to non-con/dub-con so please be careful if that affects you. 
> 
> Normal service will resume shortly.

Interlude

_The following morning, Kyle opens his eyes and he has the worst headache he has had for a number of years. He usually handles his hangovers well, but he has obviously woken up far too early or he didn’t drink enough water before falling into bed the previous night._

_He looks around and doesn’t recognise the bed he is lying in. He kind of recognises the room as the one he and Dan had spent time in the previous night, so he can only assume that they had been far too drunk to get home and they had crashed at Dave’s._

_He turns over to try and find his phone, but it’s not next to him where he would normally expect to find it. He throws his hand over to his other side to hit Dan and find out where he’s put it and he hits something solid._

_“Dan? Have you got my phone?” he asks and throws his arm down again. He still gets no response from the man, so he shifts in the bed to pull the duvet down and get him to wake up._

_As he turns over and moves the covers, he suddenly realises that something is wrong. The person next to him is naked, yes, and has exactly the same colour of hair as his partner. But as he moves closer, he realises the hair is too long. And the skin is too soft. The person shifts slightly in position and it’s at that exact second he realises that the naked person next to him is none other than Ella._

 

\---

 

Kyle immediately rushes to sit up as soon as he realizes who is sleeping next to him. He throws his legs over the side of the bed and squeezes his eyes shut as if he can will the person next to him to change. Opening his eyes, he looks over his shoulder again and sees the same girl there.

 

He can see that she is naked, so he lifts the duvet from his lower body and sees that he is also not wearing any clothes. Groaning loudly, he sees his boxers on a pile of his clothes at the side of the bed and reaches out to get them and put them back on.

 

Once he was no longer as bare as the day he was born he stands up and starts to pace from one side of the room to the other, raking his hands through his hair and over his face, trying desperately to remember anything of what had happened the previous evening.

 

The last thing he remembered was playing the keyboards for some stupid karaoke thing and drinking a beer that the girl in the bed had brought him. He can’t remember anything else concrete after that. He can feel flashes of laughter and music, but no fully fledged memories.

 

“Morning,” comes a sleepy voice from behind him, and Kyle immediately turns around to see Ella wakening up, lying on her front with the duvet exposing her bare back and her head lying on her folded arms. She’s got a sleepy smile on her lips and she’s gazing at Kyle like she’s starving and he’s the first meal she’s ever seen.

 

“What the ACTUAL FUCK ELLA?” Kyle hisses at the girl, throwing his arms up in frustration.

“ _What happened?”_ he asks her again.

 

“What do you mean? Kyle, what do you think happened?” she asks him in return, sitting up in the bed and showing off everything she had to offer.

 

“Fuck’s sake, girl will you cover those up?!” he mumbles and throws his shirt at her. “ _I don’t_ _know_ what happened! That’s why I’m asking you!” He frantically adds, panic seeping into him from all sides. “Did we have sex?” he finally asks, in a small voice, still hoping that this is all a dream, or a huge misunderstanding.

 

Ella doesn’t reply straight away. She looks up at him through long eyelashes, so reminiscent of her brother’s and her blue eyes just sparkle at him. Kyle makes a strangled cry and collapses back onto the bed with his head in his hands. The girl crawls up to his back and slides her hands down from his shoulders to his wrists and she presses a light kiss to his neck.

 

Kyle grabs her wrists and pushes her hands away from him before standing up again.

 

“Shit Ella! Stop it! Does this look like the face of someone who isn’t regretting anything we did?!” Kyle growls at her and for the first time that morning she looks embarrassed. “FUCK! I essentially proposed to your brother last night!”

 

Ella’s eyes go extremely wide at that. From what Margaret had told her Kyle was not wanting that relationship, so why had he proposed to Dan? Well he was pretty drunk the previous night, even before Ella had gotten to him so maybe that had something to do with why he was so angry about this whole situation now.

 

“Oh my god, oh my god. Oh. My. God!” Kyle mutters from the other side of the room as he tosses clothes around trying to find all of the things he had been wearing the night before. He rips his shirt away from the girl in the bed and throws it on and buttons it up as far as looks socially acceptable.

 

“Phone? Ella, where is my phone?” he demands from her. She pulls the duvet further up her chest and looks around quickly. Spotting something next to her she hands his iPhone over to him and he slides it into his pocket quickly. Patting his other pocket to make sure he had his keys and wallet, he checks the mirror and cards his hands through his hair.

 

“OK.” He says and nods at himself in the mirror. “ _We do not say anything about this to anyone, alright?”_ He stresses forcefully to her. “Dan never finds out alright?” and he glares at her until she nods slowly in agreement. “Good. Right.” He continues, trying to psych himself up to leave the room.

 

He gets to the door and listens at it quietly. He hears nothing so he cracks it open slightly to look outside and up and down the corridor. Seeing no one there, he slips out of the door and thanks the lord that the front door was next to this room. He unhooks the chain, unlocks the door using the key left in the lock and gets out of the flat with no one seeing him.

 

He breathes a huge sigh of relief as he gets the lift down to the main street and hails a taxi to take him home.

 

\---

 

Back in the penthouse, Ella is still reeling from Kyle’s reaction that morning. She wasn’t sure what she had been expecting, but his clear agitation and upset wasn’t it. She’s taking deep breaths in and out when the door opens and Margaret comes sauntering in. Dave is behind her in the doorway and when Ella realizes, she pulls the duvet up as far as she can so that she is not showing the leering older man anything.

 

“How did it go?” The woman asks her. “Did he remember anything?”

 

Ella shakes her head quickly. “Nothing happened. We got back here and he collapsed into the bed. So I stripped him and went to sleep too.”

 

“What does he think happen?” Dave asks from behind the woman.

 

“He thinks we slept together,” Ella confirms. “I didn’t say anything either way.” She says quietly.

 

“Good. Did you get photos?” Margaret asks her pointedly, and Ella blushes beetroot and nods, throwing her phone over to the woman.

 

Margaret unlocks the phone and grins at the pictures she sees there.

 

“Oh good! You’ve done so well Ella, you really have.” She coos at her.

 

“He’s not going to want me now is he?” She asks in a little girl voice.

 

“Oh don’t be silly,” Margaret scoffs. “Once he’s calmed down he’ll be absolutely fine,” she lies swiftly, and she glances over to the older man as she says it, brightness and glee sparkling in her eyes.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kudos and Comments definitely welcome...I need to know if you guys are enjoying!
> 
> xx


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OK - so onto the next bit. Second update for the day if you didn't see the previous one.   
> Please enjoy.

Chapter Eleven

Dan wakes up that morning also with a huge headache he wasn’t expecting. He also cannot

remember a lot of the previous night, but knows he lost Kyle after the singing and once the dancing had begun. He rubs his eyes with the back of his hand and feels something cold on his face. He looks at his hand and is reminded of what actually had happened the previous night when he sees the black and blue band on his middle finger.

 

He smiles and sighs softly to himself as he remembers the previous evening. He thinks he was piled into a taxi by…someone? He can’t quite remember who, which is strange as when he’s drunk he’s not usually that forgetful. Giving up trying to recall half formed memories, he picks his phone up and calls Kyle to find out how he was doing that morning. The dial tone rings a couple of times before he hears his boyfriend pick up.

 

“Yeah?” Kyle answers, sounding decidedly distracted. Dan can hear traffic going past on the other end.

 

“You’re out early,” Dan teases, and he can hear Kyle gasp on the other end. “Where are you going?”

 

“Just getting some fresh air. Got a killer headache.” He says shortly. “Oh shit. Dan, I’m really sorry, but I’ve got to run. I’ll ring later OK?” and with that Kyle hangs up.

 

Dan shrugs and goes back to looking at his ring. He has no idea where Ella is either so he texts her to ask her and gets a response saying she had crashed at Dave’s and would be home soon.

 

He stumbles out of his bed and trips over his clothes that he had clearly shed erratically while trying to get into bed the previous night and heads into the shower to freshen up. Yet again falling asleep with his contacts in had given him a serious case of dry eye to add to his headache, so after his overly warm shower and scrub, he pours eye drops into his eyes to try and loosen the lenses from the surface of his eyeball.

 

He wanders into his kitchen for coffee while his lenses decide to hydrate and he gets a knock at the front door. He heads over and opens it without checking who it is and he gets barreled into by 6 foot of bearded keyboard player.

 

Kyle grabs him quickly, swings him around against the front door and latches onto his lips fast and furiously in a heated and frenzied kiss. Barely stopping for air, He pulls apart and drags Dan into the bedroom with him, pulling at his clothes roughly until they are all thrown off and onto the floor where Dan had found them that morning.

 

“Wait!” Dan says, pulling away from the attention the other man was lavishing on him. “What’s going on?” Kyle continues to kiss and bite at Dan’s neck, ignoring the questions being thrown at him. “Kyle!” Dan says forcefully, pulling his head finally away from his neck, and staring into his eyes.

 

“What?” Kyle asks, almost aggressively, but quickly realizing before adding, “am I not allowed to be excited to see you?” and he softens his eyes and stares at Dan seductively and then licks his way back into the other man’s mouth quickly reigniting the fire between them.

 

He throws Dan onto the bed roughly and then manhandles him until he’s on his front, not bothering with any foreplay at all. He reaches over him to the side table where he knows that Dan keeps his lube and slicks his fingers up before roughly inserting his finger quickly inside his partner.

 

Dan moans deeply, not quite ready for the intrusion he knew was coming, but definitely not complaining of his treatment. He throws his head forward into the duvet cover and bites down on his whimpers and screams as Kyle then roughly inserts two more fingers in quick succession, causing an aching burn that Dan knew he would feel for the rest of the day.

 

Kyle takes him quickly and roughly soon afterwards, not bothering to fully undress himself and forcefully pounds into the singer, taking his pleasure as quickly and crudely as he could. He spills quickly into his lover before quickly flipping him over again and strokes Dan’s hard and leaking shaft to completion.

 

Collapsing on top of the singer, Kyle spaces out quickly. He’s not too sure what came over him but he had the overwhelming need to see Dan and claim him even before going home himself and changing. He knows what he did was out of character, but he needed to know that Dan still loved him and that what he had woken up to that morning wasn’t going to come between them. He needed to shield the entire situation from Dan and he wasn’t going to let one stupid drunken night ruin the best thing that had happened to him.

 

Dan comes back to reality quicker than Kyle, and starts to stroke into his hair and around his face until he feels Kyle resurfacing from wherever he had mentally gone to.

 

“You alright?” he asks him softly.

 

“Yeah,” Kyle responds. “I didn’t hurt you did I?” he adds on, softly, secretly worried he had taken the primal urge too far, and starts to slide his hands over Dan’s body to make sure there were no major bruises.

 

“No, don’t be silly!” Dan laughs quickly, and takes that moment to properly look at Kyle for the first time. “Hey, you’re still in your clothes from last night. Where did you end up going? I lost you.”

 

He sees a flash of something go through the other man’s eyes, but it’s gone almost as quickly as it’s there, and he wasn’t even sure he had seen anything at all.

 

“I ended up waking up in a room at Dave’s,” he makes up quickly, but not exactly lying. “God knows what was in that alcohol.”

 

“Do you need a shower?” Dan asks him and Kyle nods quickly. “OK, let me quickly clean up and it’s all yours.” And he gets up off of the bed and waddles to the door to wash himself up.

 

\---

 

Standing back in the kitchen waiting for his coffee machine to heat up for the second time in half an hour, Dan leans back against the counter. His eyes had become hydrated enough for him to finally get his contacts out so that’s what he was attempting to do when there was another soft knock on his front door.

 

Letting out a frustrated sigh and glancing at his coffee machine longingly, he heads over to the door to open it. He finds Ella standing on the other side of the door in her dress from the previous night and she’s looking a little bit worse for wear.

 

“God,” Dan says when he sees her. “You weren’t drinking that much were you?” he asks and she just shakes her head and mutters something about a bad night’s sleep. Shrugging, Dan lets her in and she heads over to her suitcase to get a change of clothes out. Dan turns back to his coffee and pulls three mugs out and makes the bitter drink for all three of them.

 

“Dan, can I borrow clothes…” comes a voice from the bedroom, which abruptly stops as it gets closer to the kitchen. Dan spins around to answer, and sees Kyle standing in the doorway of the bedroom in a towel slung low on his hips and using a second one to dry off his hair.

 

Ella is also staring at the same time and Kyle is just shining bright red in the face and glaring at his sister.

 

“Sorry, Kyle I should have told you Ella had come home,” Dan apologizes quickly, sensing embarrassment between the two with the state of Kyle’s current undress.

 

“No, no, it’s cool,” Kyle mumbles and heads back into the other room.

 

“Wear whatever you want though!” Dan shouts through to him. He looks over at his sister. “You alright? I should have told you he was here as well, sorry about that.” And Ella just shrugs and carries on with what she was doing.

 

Kyle comes out soon after fully dressed and hands Dan his phone. He notices Dan’s ring for the first time since he came into the house and picks up his hand to look at it properly in the new day light. Admiring the jewellery he then pulls him forward by the hand and pulls him into a deep sensual kiss again.

 

Dan stills for a second, fully aware his sister is also in the room, but he eases quickly as Kyle licks his mouth open and starts teasing his tongue with his own. Kyle opens his eyes quickly and catches the eyes of Ella, and immediately notices the wicked grin she is sporting on her face, almost daring him to do something that will tear the entire relationship apart.

 

It was that one look that made Kyle end the kiss far too early for Dan’s liking but as he pulls away Kyle says to him;

 

“Missed call on your phone. Think you’ve got a voicemail.” And Dan looks at the number and heads into the bedroom to listen to it.

 

Left alone in the living room, Ella just gives Kyle that seductive look again and purrs at him;

 

“Have you said anything to him?”

 

“Of course not!” Kyle hisses. “You think he would be like that if I had?”

 

“Is he as good as I am?” She starts, slyly. Standing and almost slithering towards him until she is right at his ear. “Do you need a reminder?” and she slides her hand up his body, over his chest, until her hand is resting on his other shoulder.

 

“Ella,” Kyle says quietly. “You will kill him if you say anything…”

 

“OK, cool!” comes a louder voice from behind them and Kyle immediately jumps away from the teenager and heads to the kitchen to gulp down coffee. “We’ll be there soon alright?” Dan says and walks fully into the living room, hanging up his phone.

 

He glances up to see Kyle in the kitchen and Ella getting clothes together. “We gotta get going!” He says happily. “That was Edith. We’re doing a last minute interview for Virgin Radio.”

 

“All of us or…?” Kyle asks quickly.

 

“As many of us as we can. Can you ring Will and Woody and see if they’re free? Ella you can come too and sit in if you want?” Dan asks and she nods quickly. “Cool, I’ll get dressed, you get showered and dressed and you ring the guys!” Dan barks out orders quickly and Kyle mock salutes at him as he walks towards him for his coffee.

 

“Oh actually, first, you need to kiss me again,” he says pointing at Kyle and swoops in for a stolen kiss tasting of second hand coffee. “Perfect!” he says, pulling away and heading into his own room to change into something more presentable.

 

“It’s radio Dan, you don’t have to look amazing!” Kyle shouts after him, chuckling lightly before catching his breath, glad not to be caught.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, Edith is Edith Bowman, she's a scottish DJ who's been on like BBC radio 1 and stuff. She's well known etc..
> 
> If I have confused anyone, I can explain anything! Please just let me know. Totally unbeta'd so all my own fault lol
> 
> Love hearing from everyone xx


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi guys. Here's another one for you.   
> If anyone needs to know, there is a character who experiences an anxiety attack in the last part of this story.
> 
> Please enjoy.

Chapter Twelve

Having rung the others before getting a ride to the studios, Dan and Kyle were aware that they would be the first to get to the radio station and begin recording their bits for the interview which was to be aired on the Monday morning. Ella had dressed in something suitably ‘hip and trendy’ while the two men wore their typical black t-shirts and jeans.

 

They were met at the reception by the producer, Martin and led up to the lounge where they would meet and discuss the format of the interview with Edith before continuing on to record it.

 

It had been a last minute interview as Edith’s previous guest had had to postpone, and as she had interviewed the band on numerous occasions over the years, she rang them to ask for a favour. Ella had never really been involved with Dan’s publicity side before, and when Dan watched her he was reminded of how Sharon had been at the photos shoot a few weeks previously. They relaxed in the large space filled with brunch and light snacks and settled themselves down onto the sofa as the producer made his excuses to leave. As he does this, Kyle runs after him asking about paracetamol and pain killers and the other man was only too willing to help with providing them for his still pounding headache.

 

Edith comes bouncing in, her long blond hair tied back and wearing old jeans and a hoody. “Hey guys, thanks so much for doing this for me at the last minute,” she thanks them, her light Eastern Scotland lilt still heard after so many years away from her home country.

 

“No problem mate,” Dan replies easily. It had been a while since they did any interviews and this would be the first one since he and Kyle became a couple, so for him and his anxiety he would prefer it to be with someone he knew compared to a complete stranger. He heads over to the corporate style red sofa and plonked himself down on top of it to await the plan for the interview.

 

Martin comes running back in with some tablets for Kyle and the man takes them greedily and throws them in his mouth, swallowing them dry. He then collapses next to Dan on the sofa, now ready to pay attention to the little he would be expected to do in the following couple of hours. Edith looks around the room to make sure it is just Dan and Kyle and she hadn’t missed the other two and she spies Ella trying to blend into the background.

 

“Oh, hi there!” Edith says to her, and Dan quickly intervenes.

 

“Sorry, guys! Edith this is my little sister Ella, it’s her birthday weekend, so she’s tagged along.”

 

“Aw cool! How old are ya kid?” Edith asks conversationally, and when she finds out she’s 16, she offers to let her help Martin with the production of the interview, which she becomes overly excited about, and Edith points her out in the direction of her new boss for the day.

 

“Thanks for that,” Dan says once she’s gone, and Kyle lets out a breath he didn’t realise he was holding once Ella had left the room. Since the flat, every time his eyes swept anywhere near the girl she caught his eye and kept giving flirty winks and biting her lip seductively and it was slowly increasing his stress levels to intense proportions.

 

“No problems! Aye, so anyway, today it’s just gonna be a straightforward question and answer. We’ve got a hashtag set up with questions coming in for you from twitter and then at the end can you perform something for us? Instruments set up in the studio?”

 

“Uh,” and Dan looks quickly at Kyle who just shrugs at him. “Yeah cool, that doesn’t sound like too big of a problem,” he says finally and Edith breathes a huge sigh of relief.

 

“Seriously, I owe you big time! Is there anything you don’t want us to cover at all?” She asks and the implication of the question is clear for them both to hear.

 

Dan and Kyle share a look again and just both shake their heads at the same time, agreeing that everything could be mentioned within reason.

 

Once they all get into the recording booth, they all settle down around the bank of microphones on the conference room table that had been set up. Will and Woody finally arrive just before the recording starts, and they’re all sitting in the normal places with Woody and Dan in the middle and Will and Kyle on the outside of them.

 

Ella has been allocated the task of going through the twitter questions and coming up with a list of the ones to ask the band when it gets to that point, and she is currently sitting in the corner of the room on the station’s twitter feed scouring through them.

 

The interview starts out easy enough, with the normal introductions from them all and Edith talking about their current tour schedule and the festivals they have lined up for the summer. There are a couple of questions about the addition of Sharon to the touring line up and they all start saying what a perfect addition she is to the music, something none of them thought they would ever say until recently.

 

After the general housekeeping is covered, the harder and more personal questions start to flow. Will and Woody know they probably won’t be involved for the next few questions, so just sit back and watch amusedly at the increasing embarrassment and awkwardness that is sure to come from the other two men.

 

“So, everyone was surprised with what happened on stage in Cornwall,” Edith starts. “Was it planned or was it all a heat of the moment kind of thing. I mean neither of you have really confirmed or denied anything…” she continues.

 

“Just so we’re clear,” Woody asks, “We are talking about Kyle and Dan yeah, cos the set was all planned and I don’t think that was a surprise for anyone!” and he laughs at his own lame attempt at a joke. Both Dan and Kyle were thankful for the interruption and attempt at buying them more time to answer the question.

 

“Yeah, I did mean between Dan and Kyle, thanks for that Woody!” and she laughs along as well.

 

“Well, Dan, did you want to field that one?” Kyle replies cheekily, as the whole thing had been his idea from the beginning.

 

“Uhm, well, OK,” he stumbles. “Well,” he says again and looks at Kyle who’s just got his eyebrows raised and he glances down at his ring. “It was planned in a way.” He finally admits. “I suppose it’s alright to say it now, but me and Kyle have been together for about 4 months now…” and there’s a slight crash from the corner of the room from where Ella is sitting.

 

“Wow!” Edith says in shock. “That’s a long time without anyone finding out. What made you decide that was the time to let everyone know?”

 

“It was really just time. There were some personal things going on at the time as well, but I think we really just realised it was silly to hide it anymore.” Dan answers tactfully.

 

“So, you’ve really never been seen with anyone before so is this it for Dan Smith?” Edith asks.

 

“Uhm, I don’t know,” Dan says uncomfortably, looking at Kyle for help and just getting more raised eyebrows in response.

 

“Don’t look at me!” Kyle replies extremely unhelpfully. “You’re the one who did it,” and he chuckles to himself. He does grab Dan’s hand though and squeezes his fingers for support. Rolling his eyes, he starts talking again. “Well, I would be upset if there was anyone else.” He chips in pointedly and Dan just laughs and says;

 

“Well, does that answer that question?”

 

“So Kyle, you’ve been with women before haven’t you, so are you just experimenting?” Edith asks him and she gets a slightly evil glance from the man for her troubles.

 

“I’ve always been pretty open to everyone Edith, and identify as bisexual, so no, not experimenting.” He answers with finality, and Edith decides to move onto the twitter questions to change the pace a bit.

 

The questions mainly revolve around new music, and the next album and further tour dates which are all easy to answer. Martin had clearly chosen these questions due to the nature of them. As soon as Ella’s questions start to filter through though there is a clear change of pace.

 

“Oh, so this person wants to know if Dyle was all for show or not? I suppose we’ve already answered that one, but is there anything you wanted to add?”

 

“Uhm, so no, not for show. Definitely a ‘thing’ if you want to call it that.” Dan answers.

 

“And for some reason someone wants to know how your weekend was?” Edith asks confused at the question, and the guys – apart from Kyle – just chuckle to themselves.

 

“Uh, well it was Dan’s sister’s birthday on Saturday so we had a get together on Saturday night and Dan and Kyle both looked a bit worse for wear when we last saw them…” Will explains to the DJ.

 

“Oh right, so this must be from someone who was there then!” Edith laughs with them. “So did you have a good time then?”

 

“From what I remember of it yeah it was pretty amazing,” the singer confirms. Kyle stays quiet, pasting a smile to his face next to his boyfriend and flicking a quick look at the teenager who was watching him in return.

 

“So last question from twitter then,” the Scot says. “OK, wow. Well you did say anything goes. So, apart from your current partners, who was the last person you fooled around with?” and the table does go quiet at that one.

 

“Well, I’ve been with my girl for years, so I couldn’t tell you even if I wanted to!” Woody laughs quickly, and Will agrees with him.

 

“Alright, fair enough,” Edith says. “Kyle?” and she looks directly at the keyboard player.

 

“Uhm, that’s really not something I think I want to be answering,” he says, hoping against hope his voice is as stable as he needs it to be without betraying any kind of guilt, but he throws a deadly look over to Ella and she at least has the grace to look worried about the fact she had supplied that question.

 

“How about you Dan?” Edith tries finally, turning to the singer and notices that he is looking at his boyfriend with a confused expression on his face.

 

“Uh, no, I think I’ll even draw the line at that question,” and he chuckles to try and ease the tension which had quickly built up.

 

“Alright then.” Edith finishes up. “So can I just get you to say you’re Bastille and that you’re listening to Virgin Radio and then we’ll get you into record?”

 

\---

 

They’re led into an incredibly small studio with a keyboard set up, someone’s bass guitar and a drum board sitting there, with some seats as well. The room is far too small for anyone else but the four of them, so Edith, Martin and Ella all stand on the other side of the glass while they set themselves up at the appropriate instruments and put on their headphones.

 

“So guys, what are you planning on playing then?” comes the voice through the headphones from the other side of the glass.

 

“We were gonna do Glory?” Dan asks rather than states for some reason. He’s still paying close attention to Kyle as they get themselves comfortable next to each other. He quickly squeezes Kyle’s thigh which gets him to look directly at him for the first time in about half an hour. “Are you alright?” he mouths to him and he just gets a wide eyed nod in response.

 

“Alright then, scaled back version of Glory for you guys.” Dan announces and after a beat of four, Kyle starts the simple notes at the top of the keyboard to start the song.

 

They spend the entire song thigh to thigh and all Kyle can feel is the intense heat of the other man as he sings and moves in time with the music and beat. They’re missing Charlie’s high range to harmonise for this version, but they manage it with little problem, but by the end of the song Kyle is so emotionally drained he doesn’t think he is able to handle much more.

 

He has to get away from the situation. He hates himself for it, but his default coping mechanism is escape, and has been for as long as he can remember. He manages to get through the goodbyes, and thank you's from the DJ and her team, but as soon as he gets out of the building he is calling a cab to take him immediately home. He can feel the fluttering in his chest and the shortness of breath that he realises is a panic attack, but as he hasn’t had one of these in a number of years he is taken by surprise and feels it much more forcefully than at any other time.

 

He’s pacing quickly, attempting to light a cigarette as Dan and the others come outside to find him. Dan immediately tenses up when he sees him, realising what is happening and heads over to him quickly to try and calm him down.

 

Woody and Will hang back to give the two of them space, and Ella moves over to them to ask what’s going on.

 

“He used to have a lot of panic attacks. Its why he’s so good with Dan’s anxiety.” Will says to her. “Something must have triggered one…” he trails off and Ella wonders whether it is her who has triggered this attack of his.

 

Dan is desperately trying to get Kyle to breathe calmly and deeply, but Kyle is having none of it.

 

“Dan, I’m fine, just need to get home and get some sleep alright?” he insists between shallow breaths.

 

His cab pulls up next to them and he quickly opens the door to get inside.

 

“Are you sure you’re gonna be OK on your own?” Dan asks quietly, Kyle trying desperately to get away from the situation.

 

“I’m seriously gonna be fine after I rest.” He tries with earnest to put his most sincere face on and Dan looks at him suspiciously before letting him go with a soft kiss to his forehead.

 

“I love you Ky,” Dan says, before shutting the door.

 

“I love you more than you know,” Kyle replies, and with that the door is shut and the cab drives off. As the car drives past the other three people on the kerb, Ella notices the look of terror on the man’s face and the small seed of guilt in her gut starts to sprout.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please ask me if I have said anything non native english speakers need explained! It goes for any chapter too!!
> 
> Kudos and Comments keep me motivated.
> 
> Thank you so much for reading and staying with me xx


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, this chapter does allude to non consensual drug use, so if this is a trigger for anyone just a warning for you. 
> 
> Please enjoy!!

Chapter Thirteen

Kyle did go home that afternoon and sleep until the next morning. While he was no stranger to sleeping unreasonably long hours, even for him this was excessive, and come Monday morning he had a headache from far too _much_ sleep. He groans and rolls over in his bed which he had made it to the previous day, and glares at the sun out of the window.

 

He still has the faint memory of panic that had overtaken him at the radio station, and he felt stupid about panicking in front of Dan. He hadn’t had a panic attack like that since just before he had started touring with him and he had forgotten how much it could take out of him. He unplugs his phone from the charger and looks at the numerous messages he had missed from nearly everyone the previous day.

 

Ignoring the general twitter notifications and emails, he sees he’s got a number of texts from his sister and a couple from his boyfriend too. He deals with Dan’s first, letting him know that he was feeling much better now and he had slept all of Sunday afternoon and night. He then looks at the message from his sister and sees it’s the daily photo update of the cats.

 

Out of his sister and his brother, Kyle had always gotten on better with his Tasha. She was the eldest out of the three of them, and even though she had teased and cajoled him when they were growing up she always apologised and realised when he had had too much unlike his brother. He and Adam were oil and water and would never get on no matter how much they tried. Because of this fact it was a simple choice when it came to decide who to look after his cats for him. That and the fact his sister was currently not working to look after her kids also helped.

 

Gazing at the photo that had been sent made him miss his animals more and that made his mind up that he would be going out to the suburbs to see them today instead of anything else. They were due to fly out to Ibiza the following day for a random Wednesday gig, and then they were skipping across the rest of Europe for a week. Today would be the last chance to see them and his sister before he went so, mind made up he got out of bed to get ready for the day.

 

\---

 

Finally feeling more human after a shower and fresh change of clothes – none of which were Dan’s (he didn’t think, anyway) – he heads out to the bus stop to get to St John’s Wood, where his sister and her family were living.

 

He put his sunglasses on to try and help with his headache, and had his headphones shoved in his ears to drown out traffic noise and unwanted attention. He had a denim jacket over his sleeveless t-shirt and was wearing an extremely old pair of jeans, that had so many holes in they were now fashionably acceptable.

 

It’s only a twenty-minute bus journey to his sister’s house and he spends the majority of the journey on twitter replying to stupid messages Dan had left over the course of the previous afternoon when he was clearly bored and had done a Q&A with the fans. Thankfully he hadn’t agreed to do anything too stupid this time, clearly learning his lesson after promising to play the one song they hadn’t practised _at all_ right before a gig in the US. He noticed a couple of strange tweets he had been tagged in by fans, ones he didn’t really understand with:

 

_#kjs!=!_

attached to it. Assuming it was all something else that he would just ignore until it went away, he turns his phone off, and gets up to jump of the bus.

 

As he walks the short distance to his sister’s place, his phone starts ringing and he sees it’s Dan trying to get hold of him.

 

“Hey, you. What you doing?” he answers automatically.

 

“Just making sure you’re OK.” The singer says on the other end. “You are OK yeah?”

 

“Dan, babe I’m fine alright?” Kyle assures him. “I’m saying bye to Tasha then I’m heading home to pack.”

 

“Alright. Coop called, he needs me to take something out tomorrow but I need to pick it up from mum and dads. Come with?” Dan asks, almost pleadingly down the phone.

 

“Oh, I dunno Dan. I was just gonna get the train to the airport…” Kyle tries to put off the possibility of spending any more time around Ella as possible.

 

“Please, Ky?” he tries again, and Kyle knows in that minute he’s going to cave. To be fair he would have been worse if he was actually in front of the blue doe eyes that always know how to get their way with him.

 

He pulls open the gate of Tasha’s front garden and walks up towards the front door of the large Victorian terraced house. Letting out a deep sigh he simple agrees and tells him to send him the times of the train in the morning.

 

“I gotta go bub OK? That’s me here. I’ll ring later, love you.” Kyle signs off and gets a ‘love you’ in return before hanging up, and pressing the Victorian doorbell inset into the brickwork.

 

He hears the chimes go off and then after a beat the tiny footsteps of little people running from behind the door, and shouting to keep away from the door.

 

The wood and glass door opens and Kyle sees his sister behind it, smiling when she realises it’s him.

 

“Oh God! Special K! Why didn’t you tell me you were coming?” She announces, using his old nickname which both she and Adam found hilarious. He gives her a quick evil loo when he hears it then is dragged into a large cuddle with the woman.

 

“Hi Tash. Just come round…”

 

“To see your boys?” she finishes for him, and he nods quickly.

 

“And you, but yeah pretty much the boys.” Kyle agrees, as his sister lets him in the house. “Oh my god! Hi!” he exclaims as he sees his cats looking sleepy in the doorway of the living room. He had had his 2 boys from kittens for 7 years. He had rescued them from Battersea at the same time and he loved them almost more than he loved Dan. One of the was a black and white ragdoll mix who was the softest thing ever and his name was Lex. The other was a ginger and white moggy who was as sarcastic as Kyle himself and only let Kyle near him. His name was Ruben and everyone else was pretty scared of him.

 

He spends the next half an hour or so playing with them and being pretty much left alone by his sister. Once they had been tired out completely, he wanders through into the kitchen to see Tasha and his niece and nephew – Claire and Logan. They were 4-year-old twins and just as much trouble as people would expect them to be. Tasha was making lunch so when Kyle walks in she just hands him a plate with a sandwich on it and he sat at the large pine table next to his niece.

 

“Uncle Kyle?” Claire asks him.

 

“What?” he replies.

 

“Mummy and daddy say you have a boyfriend. Why don’t you have a girlfriend?” Kyle looks at Tasha at that with a questioning smile.

 

“Mummy and Daddy have to stop talking about my private life!” Kyle replies sarcastically. Tasha does blush slightly at that. “Well Claire, I had a girlfriend before, but I fell in love with Dan and he is now my boyfriend.” He says simply and hopes that this is enough for a four-year-old to understand.

 

“OK,” she says simply. “Mummy can I go and watch the Night Garden?” and Tasha smiles and nods as she gets off her child’s chair and runs into the living room.

 

Logan quickly follows his sister and the adults are left alone in the kitchen.

 

“Kyle you look like crap, what’s going on? I thought you would be looking happier?” She bluntly asks. Subtlety was not a Simmons family trait.

 

“I’m fine Tash, really.” Kyle replies and she just looks at him with a raised eyebrow, completely disbelieving him. “Oh God,” he groans, letting out a long breath and throwing his face in his hands.

 

“I think I’ve done something really stupid.” He finally tells her. She says nothing, just sitting opposite him with an open look on her face and her chin resting in her hand, waiting for him to continue.

 

“I woke up the other morning with a naked girl.” He continues. “I don’t remember anything that happened at all, Tash. My head was pounding and I felt like I had the worst hangover ever.”

 

“What did Dan say?” Tasha asks him gently, and Kyle brings his hands away from his face and just looks guiltily straight at her. “Kyle, you have to tell him about this!” she admonishes quickly.

 

“I haven’t told you the worst part,” Kyle says quietly, and she raises her eyebrows inviting him to carry on. “It was Dan’s 16-year-old sister.” And in saying that he can’t even look up as she hears a sharp intake of breath from his own sister.

 

“OK, let me get this straight in my own head,” Tasha says slowly. “What were you doing the night before?”

 

“It was her 16th birthday party. I was drinking my normal amount and just beer.” Kyle tells her.

 

“And you never have any trouble with that?” She asks him.

 

“Nope, none.” He replies.

 

“Did you get all of your drinks yourself?” She asks him. He thinks hard, and then nods slowly. He did get all of them himself, apart from that one that Ella had gotten him.

 

“All but one of them,” he replies.

 

“And you can’t remember _anything_ at all?” She stresses to him. “And the mother of all hangovers…” she trails off. Kyle doesn’t understand where she’s going with this, and just looks at her with a blank expression on his face.

 

“Oh my god Kyle.” She exclaims exasperatedly. “Do you think you could have been drugged?”

 

Kyle’s expression suddenly turns into one of deep thought. He hadn’t thought of that. It would explain why he couldn’t remember anything at all and why he felt so awful the previous day. But who would do that to him?

 

“Kyle, you need to speak to Dan’s sister. If you were drugged, I don’t think you could have done anything…not unless you had Viagra as well. Does she remember what happened?” Tasha is clearly concerned for him now. Kyle looks up at her, realisation dawning on him.

 

“She says she can. I’m seeing her tomorrow. We’ll have a little talk then I think.” He says menacingly.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for sticking with me guys.   
> St John's Wood is a nice suburb of London for families.   
> Battersea is 'Battersea Dogs and Cats Home' which rehomes pets in the London area. Very famous. 
> 
> Anything else, please ask!!
> 
> Comments and Kudos definitely welcome!! xx


	14. Chapter 14

Chapter Fourteen

After spending the rest of the afternoon with his sister and heading back early evening to pack for the next week, Kyle was ready that Tuesday morning to meet up with Dan and Ella. They were flying out from Gatwick in the early evening on a British Airways flight so they had a good portion of the day for Dan to get whatever it was from his parent’s house.

 

He was meeting them at the station, and as usual he was the first person there. He noticed Dan walking through the station entrance before Dan noticed him and he watched him walk up to the departures board to find the train and platform number before turning his head in multiple directions, obviously looking for Kyle. The younger man walked up behind him and tapped him on the shoulder which was furthest away from him. Predictably Dan swung round to that side to see no one standing there, and then he turned to the other side clearly frustrated and saw Kyle standing next to him. His face breaking into a heart breaking grin, his dimples shining for everyone to see, he throws his arms around Kyle’s neck and hugs him for all he was worth.

 

“Hey baby,” Kyle murmurs into his ear softly, and smiles to himself, finally feeling normal again being in his lover’s arms.

 

Dan pulls away and holds him at arms-length to look over him. “Are you feeling better?” he makes sure quickly and sighs as Kyle rolls his eyes and nods at him. Pulling him forward again they crash lips together in a hard and quick kiss. Dan cards his hand through Kyle’s hair affectionately and holds him close again.

 

A small fake cough comes from next to Dan and Kyle and they break away to see Ella standing next to them – Dan clearly forgetting his sister was with him in the happiness he felt in seeing his boyfriend.

 

“Sorry titch,” Dan says quickly, threading his arm around Kyle’s waist and keeping him close to his side. “We’re platform 4,” he adds quickly and picks up the duffel he had brought with him before pulling Kyle over to the ticket turnstiles to get to the train.

 

Having to let Kyle go to make it through the barriers, Kyle quickly hangs back and smiles unexpectedly at the teenager.

 

“You and me have to have a little talk when we get there I think,” the keyboard player smiles through gritted teeth, and gets a stunned look back from her. Kyle cocks his head at her and gets himself through the gate and leaves the girl staring after him.

 ---

It was a boring and uneventful train journey back to Dan’s parent’s house and once Mr Smith’s car had arrived back at the house, they all stretched out of the car to do what they needed to do.

 

Kyle lets Ella slip away with her things into the house and get a proper ‘happy birthday’ from her parents before he tries to talk to her. In the meantime, he follows Dan to the studio he had at his parent’s and he waits for him to unlock the door and let them in.

 

Stepping into the space, Dan heads over to a bank of filing cabinets and pulls open a drawer and flicks through the contents inside.

 

“What is it you need anyway?” Kyle asks, moving to the keyboard and turning it on before pressing a load of keys at random.

 

“Oh, Coop found another couple of tracks that weren’t playing properly and needed the original copies to sort them out…or something like that anyway,” he tells him.

 

“You weren’t listening were you?” Kyle teases him.

 

“Nope, not at all.” Dan readily admits. “Aha!” he proclaims and holds up a number of soft sleeves with CD’s inside.

 

“You do know that if you kept all of that on the cloud or on a hard drive like someone from the 21st century you would save a lot of space?” Kyle mocks.

 

“Yes, but I will be safe when the machines take over if I have them like this,” Dan smirks at him and sticks his tongue out at him. Kyle cocks an eyebrow at him.

 

“Really?” he says, stalking towards the other man, and Dan notices the mischievous glint in his eyes and starts to look for an escape plan. He feints moving to the right and then dodges back to the left to try and get away from Kyle’s extended arms. Far too slow and clumsy, Dan knocks into a strategically placed table and falls into the waiting embrace of his partner, and then barrels them both onto the floor, both exploding with laughter as it happens.

 

Kyle ends up on top of them both and they stop laughing when they realise their position. Kyle gazes down onto Dan, and is then shocked further when Dan lifts his leg over his hip and flips them so Dan was on top.

 

“Well that was surprisingly athletic,” Kyle comments breathlessly.

 

“Shut up,” Dan replies and brings his mouth down over his partner’s in a deep and filthy kiss. He licks at the seam of Kyle’s lips and dips his tongue inside the other mouth to slide silkily against the other’s. Mouths opening and closing in synch is all that moves in the small studio until there’s a knock at the door, breaking them out of their private bubble. Groaning, and pressing a final kiss to Kyle’s swollen lips, Dan pushes himself up off of the ground to look through the glass door to see his mother waiting for him.

 

“OK gorgeous, let’s get out of here,” he says and sticks his hand out to help Kyle off of the floor. He picks up the discs and heads out of the studio hand in hand with his boyfriend.

 ---

 Kyle left Dan to have tea and a chat with his parents and he went wondering around the house subtly looking for the teenager. He moved down the hallway and found a door half open. He peered round the corner and found a study type arrangement and he saw the girl’s back facing him. He takes a deep breath and knocks on the door. She turns round in the chair and sees it’s Kyle and gives him that seductive smile she had been sporting since Sunday morning. He moves into the room and pushes the door shut behind him, shaking his head as he goes.

 

“Hey, daddy,” she purrs at him. “Needed some alone time for a second round huh, baby?” Kyle was leaning against a large crafting table with his arms crossed and just continues to shake his head.

 

“Ella…” he says seriously, and he automatically sees her flirty façade falter, just slightly. He decides to just call her bluff and confront her. “What was in my drink?” he says. A slight sing song rhythm to the question.

 

“I don’t know what you mean,” the girl replies after a long silence and looking down at the floor and studiously now trying to avoid his eyes. A bright red flush spread all over her face and down to the neckline of her t-shirt. This told him everything he needed to know. He nods to himself, and when she eventually looks up at him again he puts a slight smile on his face.

 

“You played me.” He says slowly and deliberately. “I thought of you as a little sister as well you know. You mean a lot to him, so I can’t never speak to you, but I will never trust you again. Lose my number,” he finishes and heads towards the door. Something in the corner of the table catches his eye and he picks up a bag of metallic confetti in blue and red. “I’m taking this as part of my compensation. Go screw yourself Ella.”

 

\---

 

Kyle doesn’t see her again before they both get into Dan’s car for the airport. The flight was at 5pm and the airport was just over an hour away so they bid their farewells to Dan’s parents and left in plenty of time to get there. Dan had decided he was going to drive up and leave the car in the airport parking for ease, even though it cost a small fortune to do it.

 

Kyle slid into the passenger seat as Dan turned on the ignition and he got comfortable with his sunglasses on and watched his lover drive off. His Apple Music automatically started playing his music and Dan looked over to him and smiled.

 

“What?” he says self-consciously and smiles again showing those dimples that made Kyle’s heart flutter.

 

“Nothin’, just watching you.” Kyle sits in silence for a number of miles and watches as the motorway and other cars speed by. Robert Miles’ ‘Children’ plays through the cars speakers and he can see Dan drumming the rhythm and beat on the steering wheel.

 

Kyle finally pulls his phone out and opens up the camera app. He switches it to the video feature and presses record. He spins the phone around the car to give a view of the passing scenery and lands on Dan tapping the wheel and bouncing up in time with the music. The opening chords to the Final Countdown come on and Dan starts to sing it, completely oblivious to Kyle recording the whole thing.

 

“What you doing Dan?” Kyle asks loudly, and Dan turns around to look at him and starts to blush furiously when he sees the camera on him. “What song is that, Dan?” he asks again and Dan flips the camera off.

 

“That’s the Final Countdown, Kyle.” He finally responds, knowing that the man was just going to annoy him until he answered.

 

“Is that the new single, Dan?” Kyle asks with a laugh in his voice, and Dan gives the camera a fantastic bitch face. “Where are we going Dan?” he tries again.

 

“Ibiza, Kyle.” And with that he spins the camera to himself and gives it a huge smile and a thumbs up and turns the camera off.

 

“You are a major nightmare; do you know that?” the singer asks him in all seriousness.

 

Kyle says nothing in response, but gives him a beaming smile and reaches over to kiss him on the cheek.

 

“Oh that’s going onto twitter by the way,” he tells him slyly as he sees the airport come into view, and he relaxes knowing this leg of the tour was going to go really well.

\---

 Back at the Smith residence, a sixteen year old girl was in floods of tears in her bedroom. She gets her phone out and sends a text to who she felt was her only ally in this plan.

 

_Ella – he knows nothing happened. He’s angry. What do I do?_

_Margaret – don’t worry about anything my dear. Everything will be sorted when he gets home and he’ll come crawling back. Keep in contact with him and get him to notice you again. It will all be fine._

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi all! So some links for you...
> 
> Robert Miles 'Children' - (classic BTW) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6QEPrDBMqJ0  
> Europe 'Final Countdown' - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9jK-NcRmVcw
> 
> Please enjoy.   
> Thank you for spending time reading and commenting x


	15. Chapter 15

Chapter Fifteen

Parking up in the multi-storey at the airport was easy and they head into the terminal to check in their bags and get their boarding passes. The girl checking them in had absolutely no idea who they were so they were relatively quick to head through to the priority security lane which they always made sure they had paid for when they flew anywhere. It was always an experience watching Kyle getting through the security gates due to his love of wearing anything with a hint of metal on it, but to everyone’s surprise it was Dan who was randomly selected to be checked by the guards and his bag was also wiped down to check for drugs. Kyle watched with pleasure from the other end of the security hall, and when Dan was finished he walked towards his boyfriend. Kyle opened his mouth to say something typically sarcastic, but Dan just put his hand in his face and walked past him.

 

“Save it, Ky!” he says simply.

 

“Aw you can’t expect me to not say anything right now can you?” he shouts after him gleefully.

 

“If you really loved me you wouldn’t say anything,” Dan replies as he carries on towards the BA Executive Lounge to meet the others.

 

“That’s a low blow, Smith,” Kyle grumbles, catching up quickly with his partner and attacking his waist from behind, propelling him forward into oncoming Japanese holiday makers.

 

“Sorry! Oh my God, we’re so sorry,” Dan apologises as they avoid them right at the last minute. Kyle silently starts to giggle into Dan’s ear, causing the other man to start laughing as well. “ _Stop it!”_ he stresses to the brunet with a smile and glint in his eyes, and walks through the automatic doors and up to the welcome desk of the lounge.

 

They both hand their boarding passes over to the older woman behind the desk who was eyeing them suspiciously as if she was sceptical they should even be there. She obviously looked them up and down and took in every piece of old and battered clothing the two of them were wearing. The guys didn’t dress up to travel. There was no point.

 

“Can I see your Executive Cards please gentlemen?” she asks icily, and Kyle just side eyes the singer and swallows down more laughter.

 

Dan pulls his card out of his wallet to show it to the woman and she is visibly surprised to see it is a Gold members card, before handing it back to him. She turns them with a raised eyebrow at Kyle, impatiently waiting for his.

 

Unfortunately, Kyle being Kyle, decided now was a fantastic time to play up and annoy the woman. He starts to pat the pockets of his leather jacket, looking confused. He then put his hands in his jeans pocket and brought them out empty.

 

“Shit,” he curses loudly, “where the hell is my wallet?” and he can see Dan smirking very cautiously to the side of him. The woman in front of him rolls her eyes and continues to wait with annoyance. She opens her mouth to start to say something, but Kyle lifts his hand with a finger up in the universal sign to ‘hang on a minute’, and throws his bag off of his back.

 

“It must be in here, hang on a sec,” he says to her, and throws his bag up on to the glass of the welcome desk and pushes the sign in book off of it. The woman sighs with frustration, and Kyle continues to pretend to ignore her.

 

He unzips his North Face back pack and starts puling stuff out of it slowly and as carefully as if each piece would break if he looked at it the wrong way. He brings out his MacBook, headphones, portable hard drive, drumsticks, neck pillow, sunglasses, bag of toiletries, a binder full of paperwork he tended to take with him everywhere and a whole load of magazines. Finally, he pulls out a copy of NME that had the whole band on the front of it from a few months ago and he throws it on top of all of his crap. He notices the woman look at the photo on the front of the publication and her eyes go wide quickly.

 

“Sir, really, I’m sure I can find you another way…”

 

“Nonono, you’re only doing your job…hang on, let me put all this away again,” and he throws everything back into his bag quicker than he had pulled everything out and put his bag on the floor.

 

“Ah!” he finally says after putting on a thoughtful look for a few moments. He shoves his hand in his back jeans pocket and pulls out his brown leather wallet, battered and bashed from years of use. “Knew it would be around here somewhere!” and he pulls out his own Gold Members card and hands it over to the woman.

 

“Th-thank you sir,” the woman says, flushing with embarrassment and points them through to the lounge.

 

Kyle leans over the counter, almost conspiratorially and stage whispers to the woman;

 

“Never judge a book by its cover…all customers should be treated the same!” and he swaggers off after his boyfriend.

 

“And this is why we have to leave extra early every time! Ky, 20 minutes to do that!” Dan hisses at him.

 

“I know! I was trying to make it longer, but I really had nothing else in my bag,” Kyle replies sadly, as he heads towards where he can see the rest of the band are congregating.

 

“Every time Kyle, really?” Will asks him. “We saw you walk in yonks ago!” and the keyboard player laughs again.

 ---

 The number of them heading out for the next week is much larger than the group that headed to Cornwall. Because they were having to move large amounts of kit around and do things a lot faster than they would if it was one gig, there was about 10 of them in the lounge and a few more would be meeting them out there.

 

Sharon looked shell shocked again with all the new people she was being introduced to, but she was sitting snugly on Charlie’s lap and he was keeping her up to speed on everyone that was there. Dan and Kyle were the last ones to arrive and they still had an hour until the plane was even boarding.

 

Kyle headed over to the self-service bar and got himself and Dan a diet coke and grabbed himself a handful of chocolate mini muffins and wandered back to the group. Dan had found himself a seat and was now – as usual – the one everyone was wanting to talk to. Kyle handed him his drink and started to eat his muffins when Dan steals one from him, earning an affronted ‘how could you’ look from his boyfriend. He looked around the group and caught Tom videoing them and he rolled his eyes to the camera.

 

“Kyle, I need your expert opinion on neck pillows,” Woody announces from behind him.

 

“He is the perfect person to ask, to be fair,” Dan agrees and Kyle shrugs and drops his drink and bag next to Dan and kisses him on the cheek before heading out with the drummer. He waves cheekily to the woman behind the desk as they go out and she just glares at him.

 

“Why do you need another neck pillow?” Kyle asks him as they leave the large lounge.

 

“Well I did forget mine stupidly, but I wanted to talk to you anyway.” Woody replies and pulls him towards a Pret a Manger outlet and sat him at a table. Sitting down he raises his eyebrows at his friend.

 

“You know, I can’t wait for a time where one of you isn’t pulling me or Dan away to talk to us,” he jokes to the other man.

 

“Panic attack, dude,” Is all Woody says to him.

 

“Yeah, I know.” Kyle says quietly. “It’s fine. It’s all been sorted, so shouldn’t happen again alright?”

 

“What’s all been sorted, though? I don’t want another Sharon and Margaret situation going on here. That was enough for one career.”

 

“Look, mate its fine alright. This Ella thing just became a bit more…complicated, but I’ve got it under control. Don’t bother Dan with it alright?” Kyle pleads with him.

 

“Kyle, tell me what the hell happened at that party!” Woody demands. Kyle groans and puts his head in his hands before pushing his hair back from his face and sighing.

 

“Alright, but you _cannot_ tell Dan OK. He’ll flip and he doesn’t need to know!” Kyle insists and doesn’t say anything else until Woody nods at him.

 

“Ella drugged my drink at the party. I don’t know what happened after I passed out, but I do know I woke up in bed with her the next morning and we were both naked.”

 

“What the fuck Simmons! Are you fucking kidding me?!” Woody explodes at him. Kyle gives him a look and indicates people are looking at him and he goes quiet quickly.

 

“I know, alright!” Kyle whispers at him. “But nothing adds up alright. I didn’t sleep with her, I know that much.”

 

“How do you know?”

 

“Well my sister said that unless there was something else in the drug I wouldn’t be able to…. y’know…perform,” he says vaguely. “And some other stuff makes me think nothing happened either…”

 

“What other stuff?” Woody asks and Kyle gives him the stink eye. “You want me to believe you man you better get talking,” he adds gravely.

 

“OK, how about the fact I was so goddamn horny the following morning I pounded into Dan’s ass until he couldn’t walk straight?” Kyle hisses quietly so that only Woody could hear.

 

“I didn’t want to know that, did I?” he says to Kyle, shaking his head violently, as if trying to get the image out of his mind.

 

“You asked man.” Kyle tells him. “Anyway, I spoke to her today and she’s well aware she is to leave me alone, I have no interest in anything she says and that whatever she wanted is not going to happen. Please don’t tell Dan, it’s not just about me, but he doesn’t need to know this about his little sister, yeah?”

 

woody sits in silence for a minute and watches tourists and travellers mill around them, going about their own business. He spots a couple of people who were paying close attention to them as if they recognised them and he flicks his attention back to the man in front of him.

 

“Fine. As long as I don’t think he needs to know I won’t tell him. If this gets out of hand I will say something.” And he finishes it with a menacing point at the man’s face.

 

“Thank you Wood.” Kyle says genuinely to the man. “Shall we go and get you a pillow?”

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always guys, any questions or comments always welcome x


	16. Chapter 16

Chapter Sixteen

The flight was uneventful. Two and a half hours of flying in a steel tube, thousands of miles in the air had become normal for the guys and they just settled into the normal routine they had when they were travelling. Dan, Kyle and Will were all sitting in the row together with Dan at the window and Kyle being in the middle. Kyle – as normal – instantly popped his headphones in his ears, put his pillow round his neck and promptly fell asleep, drooling on Dan’s shoulder within fifteen minutes of boarding.

 

Dan spent the majority of the flight switching between staring out of the window at the clouds and composing music in his head, and reading through the terrible in flight magazines, browsing through the offered in flight purchases. Kyle woke up briefly for the free food and drink, but he quickly relaxed back into the warmth of his partner and his snoring started soon after, earning and amused look from Will and a zoomed in close up from Tom as he started taping the journey.

 

This being one of the first times Sharon had ever been on a plane, she was hyper and excited and was acting up for the camera as well as for Charlie and Dan was easily distracted by the young love displaying itself in front of him.

 

When they were about forty minutes from landing, Will got up to stretch his legs, and Dan looked up to see that Coop had slid into his seat. Dan gave him a quick look of confusion.

 

“Hey mate, I’ve got those discs you needed,” he pre-empts the man quickly.

 

“Aw, cool, no that’s not what I wanted.” Coop tells him. “Is he easy to wake up when he’s like this?” he asks Dan, pointing at Kyle. Dan just shrugs.

 

“It depends how deep he is,” and he pulls the ear buds out of Kyle’s ears and starts to shake him to try and rouse him.

 

“Nghhhh,” is all the noise that comes from the man, causing Dan to shake him harder and push him off of his shoulder. “Eurgh…. hit me baby one more time!” comes quickly from the younger man’s mouth, much to the two other men’s surprise. Kyle opens his eyes and flicks them from side to side to re-orientate himself to his current situation. He sees both Coop and Dan looking at him with cocked eyebrows and smirks on their face.

 

He rubs his eyes to remove any sleep and then wipes at his mouth in case there’s any drool stuck there.

 

“What?” he asks the others who are still looking at him.

 

“Britney? Really?” Dan laughs at him, and Kyle looks slightly embarrassed remembering his dream that was quickly fading from his head.

 

“Jealous?” he counters trying to make his humiliation less. Dan just scoffs at the suggestion.

 

Looking to his left, Kyle notices Coop properly for the first time, and nods at him in greeting.

 

“Hey man. Good flight?”

 

“Yeah, need to ask you a huge favour,” Coop asks without any preamble. Kyle, ever suspicious, just looks at him questionably. “One of my friends is the sound guy for The Script and their keyboard player has dropped down with some sort of lurgy or plague…”

 

The Script were one of the headliners at the festival they were off to and were due to play immediately after them in the running order the following evening.

 

“Shame…and this has what to do with me?” Kyle asks, but fully expecting what was coming next.

 

“They don’t need you for the whole set, but there’s a couple of songs they really need a keyboard player for…could you?” and this earns a groan from the keyboard player.

 

“But if this gets around, people will think I’m like a nice guy or something…” he whines, and this earns a laugh from next to him. “ _Fine._ I need to know which songs and get music for it though.”

 

“Sure, of course! I’ll let them know when we land, cheers mate. I owe you.”

 

“I’ll add it to the list!” he calls over to the man as he scrambles back to his seat, the pilot announcing over the intercom that they will be landing soon and the seatbelt sign being switched back on.

 

\---

 

Landing in Ibiza and getting their luggage was always a time consuming ordeal. With all the kit they were carrying with them, the runners and crew were left to organise it all and the rest of them head through into the arrivals area. They head directly to the bar while they waited for the rest of them and automatically started drinking.

 

It had been a long day for all of them, and this combined with relatively cheap alcohol was always a bad combination.

 

Kyle – surprisingly for everyone – was the person who bought the first round. It wasn’t like he was cheap normally, but he did usually have to have a couple in him before he splurged his cash on the rest of the team.

 

“If I do it now, I won’t get annoyed and made fun of for the rest of the trip,” he explains quietly to Dan as he brings him his drink and pecking him on the cheek, earning him a bashful smile from the other man.

 

Once the kit had been collected and the drinks had been finished, they head outside to find their transport and were all driven to the hotel they had been booked into for the next 2 nights.

 

They had all managed to get into the Hard Rock Hotel in Ibiza, and they were all pretty excited about it. It was one of the nicer hotels they had been put up in, and Dan had to wonder sceptically what he had done to Dave to warrant this kind of treatment. Booking in, it was discovered that they had all been booked into separate rooms, so it then took time for them to organise it so that the couples on the trip could get doubles and other rooms were refunded. This all took time, and it was relatively late by the time it was sorted, but it didn’t stop a large proportion of the group to organise to meet up in half an hour to go drinking more and have some fun.

 

They all split up to get to their rooms, and Dan and Kyle hit the lift to get to the fourth floor where they had been put. Swiping the key card against the lock, they open the door and are faced with a pretty amazing room. It appeared only slightly smaller than Dan’s entire living room and kitchen put together. Ahead of him were a set of sliding picture windows leading out onto a spacious balcony, and beyond that was a perfect view of the beach and the sea.

 

To the right of the picture windows, there was a short corridor leading to what the men could see was a bathroom with more windows looking over the sea and a large spa tub where you could lie and soak up the atmosphere. The bed was huge and was opposite and entire mirrored wall. As soon as Dan looked at the mirrors, his mind was reeling with how Kyle would look riding him in the throes of passion in the reflection of the glass.

 

He glanced up and saw Kyle looking at him, and felt his face turning a shade of pink, despite not seeing any sun that day.

 

“I’m not saying that’s a bad thought you’re having, but I really don’t think I’d want to rush whatever you’re thinking,” Kyle whispers into his ear and then he lightly licks at Dan’s ear lobe, causing a low rumble to come from the back of the singer’s throat.

 

“We need to get changed baby,” Kyle adds quickly, and Dan reluctantly agrees.

 

The two men end up downstairs after half an hour to meet everyone else. Kyle had changed from his scruffy travelling clothes into a pair of three quarter length black cargo trousers with white Adidas trainers and a black t-shirt. Dan had changed into a pair of black cut-off jeans and his “I Killed Laura Palmer” t-shirt with black and white chucks.

 

Decidedly the most casual of the whole group, everyone else had decided to completely dress up for some reason. The boys didn’t feel left out though, neither of them ever really dressed up for any reason unless made to or for a special occasion.

 

They all head down to one of the dining areas in the hotel which had been turned into some sort of club for the night, boasting old-school disco and music, and reportedly not playing anything that had been recorded after 1995.

 

“Well this will be interesting to hear,” Kyle says mischievously as they pass the sign for it, and Dan knew automatically that the other man was going to try everything for them to break their promise, just because he could. Kyle had some sort of idiot savant mind for music and seemed to know everything about all types.

 

“Don’t start any trouble,” Dan hisses at him, and Kyle gives him the wide eyed puppy look, trying to look as innocent as possible, causing more laughter from his lover.

 

They spend a good couple of hours all dancing together and drinking as much as they could. The group had a number of green shots sent over to them from a group of women who were watching them most of the evening and eventually they were all very buzzed and their decision making skills had started to fail them.

 

When Word Up by Cameo came over the speakers, Kyle got extremely excited and tried to pull Dan onto his feet from the booth they had fallen into during some less than exciting music that had been on previously.

 

“Nope, nuh-uh, no more dancing for Dan,” the singer announced to Kyle, and the man’s face just fell and he pouted at him. “I’m tired and sore! I don’t wanna!” he cries when he sees Kyle’s face.

 

Suddenly two arms grab Kyle’s shoulders and pulls him towards the dancefloor. He turns quickly and sees the blond hair of Sharon behind him.

 

“C’mon, Charlie won’t dance either. Let’s go do it!” she shouts into his ear, and Kyle immediately perks up.

 

“See!” he shouts at his boyfriend and points at the backing singer. “I love her more now!” and he rushes to the dancefloor to start dancing with the girl.

 

By this point, Kyle was so far gone he was just a mess of arms and legs, but surprisingly his rhythm was still on point and Dan did feel a pang of jealousy and arousal when watching him dance up close to the girl. He watched Kyles face get closer to the blond as she said something to him and his excitement at the idea as they both rush off of the dancefloor.

 

Dan immediately perks up and watches them run out of the room, but feels a hand on his shoulder and a voice saying;

 

“Relax, they’ll be fine.” And he turns to see Charlie lounging behind him with a smile on his face.

 

\---

 

Just over an hour later, Dan is relaxing in his room and looking at his phone, wondering where Kyle had gotten off to. He had received a message from the man telling him he would be back soon – well he assumed that was what it meant. There were a number of spelling mistakes and it went on for longer than necessary, but he was starting to worry now.

 

The moment he unlocked his phone and considered ringing him, there was a bang at the door and Kyle then stumbled through it laughing at himself.

 

“Heeeeeeeeey!” he drawls, the word ending up a lot longer than he had intended it to.

 

“Where have you been?” Dan almost demands of him, but checks his tone when he realises.

 

“I got a tattoo!” Kyle proudly announces to his boyfriend, and laughs at Dan’s shocked face. “Sharon wanted one. She’s so cool by the way? So I went with her cos that was such an _awesome_ idea! I miss Charlie, you know, cos he was like the little one, but I’m glad he’s with her, cos she’s little too…” he starts to ramble, and Dan scrambles over to him and grabs his chin to bring his attention back to him.

 

“Tattoo, Ky?” he asks him, trying to get him to focus.

 

“Oh! Yeah! It’s not big. It’s only little. Like Charlie. And Sharon…” and he holds his left hand out to show the other man. Dan doesn’t notice it straight away, but when he does his heart does melt slightly – and yes he may still be a bit drunk too.

 

On the ring finger of Kyle’s left hand, were the initials ‘D.C.S’ in italicised writing and next to it was a treble clef.

 

Dan’s face breaks into a huge grin, and he pulls his boyfriend towards him for a hard kiss, immediately pushing his tongue into his mouth for a deeper experience. Kyle moans into it, but pulls back quickly, causing a whimper from Dan.

 

“I’m really tired…” he starts and Dan understands immediately and pulls him towards the bed and lays him down, still fully clothed. He undoes his trainers and throws them in the corner of the room. Getting onto the bed himself he pulls Kyle close to his chest and hugs him tightly while they both fall asleep.

 

\---

 

_Kyle was standing in a large room, red curtains lined the walls and red sofas with large plump red cushions are in front of him. He looks around and sees he’s completely alone. He doesn’t say anything. He thinks he is meant to be where he is._

_A door opens somewhere and a small shadow starts moving its way towards him. He isn’t scared, but anticipates what is to come. The figure walking towards him is no taller than 4 foot and he moves towards him with a rolling gait, almost two stepping towards where he stands._

_Jazz music, slightly out of tune and not attesting to any rhythm plays gently in the background. He doesn’t recognise it. It doesn’t sit right in his ears and the noise perturbs him. The man walking towards him – it was a man – starts to roll his entire body in time with the out of time music, making his movements even more bizarre._

_Kyle moves to stand on the sofa behind him as the man moves towards him. He can see him clearly now, and the midget is wearing a complete blood red suit, with darker red shirt underneath, buttons undone at the top. His black patent leather shoes shone in the low light making the entire experience creepier than it should have been._

_The red suited man starts to dance in circles in front of where Kyle was standing on the sofa and he looks down at his hands he notices he is holding handfuls of fine golden glitter. He raises his hands and the glitter starts to slowly fall through his fingers, falling onto the man in front of him._

 

\---

 

Startling himself awake, Kyle gasps loudly and sits bolt upright in bed. He looks around him, not completely sure of where he was and it takes a few moments for him to get his bearings.

 

He looks around him and sees Dan has rolled over to the other side of the bed at some point, and he can see he is still in his clothes from the previous night. He sighs deeply and reaches for his phone to see what time it was. The time was still only 5am, so he slides out of the bed and takes his clothes off before getting back in next to Dan in just his boxers.

 

He has another quick look at his phone. He has three missed calls and 2 text messages from the previous night. He had clearly ignored them when he was out.

 

He goes into his call logs and notices the calls are from Ella. She hasn’t left him any voicemails. He rolls his eyes at his phone, and swipes into his messages.

 

_Ella – Kyle I can’t live without you talking to me we need to see each other_

_Ella – Kyle, please. Talk to me. I’ll do anything. I’ll make you happier than he will. PLEASE!_

 

Kyle sighs again. Maybe that crazy dream was a foreshadowing of something, he didn’t know or believe in dream interpretation anyway, but even he could now see that this whole situation was getting out of hand.

 

He deletes the messages, deletes the call logs and tries to get some more sleep.

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey all! So drunken dreams are mad eh?? Have actually had similar dreams in the past...unfortunately I was not drunk.
> 
> Links for you:  
> Cameo - Word Up https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MZjAantupsA
> 
> All comments welcome and needed!! They make me write faster, and I am so glad you're keeping with me, thanks to everyone who reads.


	17. Chapter 17

Chapter Seventeen

Dan wakes up with the sun shining through the huge windows the following morning. His head didn’t hurt too bad, and he looked around to see if Kyle was still asleep. He noticed the other man had clearly woken up and changed at some point as he was only in his underwear next to him under the covers. He is lying on his back and looks as peaceful as he can, the soft natural upwards curve of his lips making him look as if he was having an extremely pleasant dream. Dan’s eyes slide down the other man’s naked chest, and to the slight trail of dark hair visible above the duvet cover, teasing what was below.

 

Kyle was still fast asleep if his breathing was anything to go by. Dan checks the clock on his phone and seeing it is still relatively early, he dips down under the covers and crawls to the bottom of the bed. He had woken up half hard and he wasn’t going to waste the huge bed in the luxurious hotel room they had access to for two days.

 

He gently pulls Kyle’s black Calvin’s off of his hips and down his legs. Knowing his boyfriend as he did, he wasn’t surprised when he didn’t even stir with the movement. Dan noticed he was also semi aroused for whatever reason and it automatically causes more blood to rush to his own groin.

 

He bends his head down towards the waiting erection, but purposefully avoids it and sucks deeply on the crease between hip and groin, causing a slight movement from the man under him. Dan noses at the coarse hair peppering Kyle’s cock and surrounding skin, and the musky scent makes him moan in appreciation.

 

Hardly able to stop himself now, he licks a stripe from the base of the cock to the tip and then tongues the slit waiting for him. Still, not waking the other man, but having caused his member to now stand to full attention, he wraps his lips over the silky head and applies slight pressure on it. This seems to have the desired effect as Dan feels the cover over his head lift up and he darts his own eyes upwards to see Kyle gazing down at him with a sleepy look still in his eyes.

 

Dan decides at that moment to take his entire erection in and swallow him whole. This causes Kyle to throw his head backwards onto the pillow and groan in delight. The noise just encourages Dan more, and he starts to suck up all of the pre-come leaking freely from the tip now. He shoves his hand down his own underpants and starts to jerk himself off to the obscene noises coming from above him and the heavy feeling of his lover on his tongue.

 

Wanting to add another dimension to his boyfriend’s pleasure, Dan take his other hand and pulls it through the spit that was collecting at the base of Kyle’s dick and then traces it slowly over his balls and perineum, causing gasps and whines to be drawn from them both. Eventually ending at his entrance, he rubs circles around the hole and breaches the muscles slowly and purposefully. Swearing and squealing start to come from the other man in ways Dan had never heard before. He pushes his finger in further and starts to crook then end, looking for the bundle of nerves that will cause Kyle to scream his name in pleasure.

 

He moves his own hand over his own arousal quicker, sucks faster and then lightly tickles over Kyle’s prostate and that is it for the younger man. Screaming Dan’s name, he spurts heat into Dan’s waiting mouth and Dan just sucks and swallows the entire release as if he had never had anything better in his life. Dan throws himself over the edge as soon as Kyle is spent and his release comes hot and sticky over the mattress and covers.

 

“Uhm, morning?” Kyle says, still not quite awake, and confused in his post coital haze.

 

Dan crawls up him so he is now lying fully on top of Kyle with his head poking up from under the covers. He smiles brightly at the other man and laughs lightly.

 

“Morning, I was bored,” he says to him.

 

“God!” Kyle exclaims and throws his head back onto the pillow again. “That’s meant to be my line! Have I created a monster?”

 

\---

 

After showers for them both and getting dressed, there is a knock on their door and Kyle heads over to answer it while Dan ties his shoe laces. Coop is on the other side of the door in khaki shorts and white t-shirt, looking the epitome of a British tourist, with sandals on his feet.

 

“Good! You’re up! Wasn’t sure after you disappeared last night.” Coop says brightly and walking into the room when Kyle opened the door wider for him.

 

“Yeah, yeah, whatever. You want something?”

 

“Two things. First, oh esteemed leader, I need those discs,” he says, turning and then pretending to bow down to Dan, still sitting on the bed. With a wry chuckle, Dan rolls across the bed to his backpack near the window and digs the cases out for him.

 

“I emailed you the set list yesterday, did you get it?” Dan asks, handing over the discs and Coop just nods at him.

 

“Yup, don’t worry. Secondly,” and he pulls a rolled up plastic file from out of his back pocket and hands it to Kyle. “Here ya go. Songs and music for your cameo performance tonight.”

 

“Ooh. Yay.” Kyle responds unenthusiastically, flipping through the pages, and nodding when he sees the songs.

 

“You’ll be OK with those?” Coop has to ask, just to make sure he isn’t going to cock up the other band’s set.

 

“Surprisingly, I already know two of them so yeah, I think I’ll be fine.” Kyle says to him. Coop gives him a strange look when he says it. “That’s a story you don’t ever have to know about,” he says to him cockily, and leads him towards the door to show him out.

 

“How many do they want you for?” Dan asks him as Kyle shuts the door behind the sound man.

 

“Four.” He replies and reads off the names.

 

“It’s a good thing you like them really,” Dan laughs.

 

“It’s a good thing I learned a hell of a lot of their songs when I was bored!” Kyle jokes back.

 

Both the men pick up their bags with everything they would need for the day in them. They both had change of tops in the bags to perform in and a range of entertainment to keep them busy for the day – not that Kyle would need it as he would be attached to a keyboard somewhere for most of the day – and they went down to meet some of the others for breakfast before heading out to the ground.

 

\---

 

They walk into the large room that was set up for the breakfast and was met with a huge breakfast buffet they were to help themselves to. Seeing the rest of the band, they move over to them to dump their bags before piling food on their plates.

 

Dan gets over to the buffet first, but before Kyle is able to join him, Charlie marches round the table to him, grabs his arm and literally drags him out of the door they had just walked in.

 

“What the hell man?” Kyle exclaims as Charlie lets him go next to a ridiculously sized fish tank with a number of large exotic looking and dangerous fish inside.

 

“Ooh, don’t try and act like you’re all innocent Kyle!” Charlie hisses. “I trusted you to look after her! I can’t believe you let her do that!”

 

“What exactly is it that I am meant to have done?” Kyle cries, clearly confused.

 

“Sharon’s tattoo!” Charlies says, and Kyle just shrugs at him.

 

“What you didn’t like it?” Kyle asks, eyes wide.

 

“One of them was fine…”

 

“She got more than one?” Kyle asks. “She only had one when I left her. Uhm…the wwcomms symbol…somewhere, I forget where.” He tells Charlie.

 

“On her hip.” Charlie fills in for him and Kyle snaps his fingers, remembering when he is told. “Oh yeah, that’s fine! It’s the ‘I love Kyle’ on the other side I was talking about!”

 

Kyle’s mouth falls wide open in shock. “Are you kidding me?” he says and laughs hysterically, not able to stop. Looking at the upset on Charlie’s face, he apologises quickly. “Dude, I’m sorry, I really am, but that is so funny! What has she said?”

 

“She can’t remember it.” He says sullenly, realising that maybe Kyle had nothing to do with it. At that moment, Sharon comes out and stands next to them.

 

“CB, I told you, it was my idea, I’m sure of it, and I was really drunk! Don’t blame Kyle.” She pleads to Charlie. Kyle takes that moment to extract himself from the situation and go and get some food, still chuckling to himself.

 

\---

 

Getting to the festival venue, the place is up and running, having started the previous day, and this being the second day of music out of three. The Script were the main headliners of the second day, and Bastille were the act before them.

 

Most of the crew head off to find their kit and have it queued up for when they were needed. Coop grabs Kyle’s arm and drags him over to his friend so that he can go and practise with the other band for a couple of hours. He gives Dan a quick kiss goodbye and allows himself to be taken elsewhere for the second time that day.

 

He gets taken to a tent that was being used for storage, but a board had been set up for him and there were three other guys standing in there too with their own instruments.

 

“Guys, this is Kyle, he’s the one who’s gonna do your keys for tonight,” Coop introduces him, and Kyle gives a wave at the others as they look at him.

 

“Hey Kyle, thanks for this,” One of the men says to him. Kyle recognises him as Danny, the lead singer. “I’ll be able to do most of the keys, but it’s just a few of the songs I need help with,” and Kyle nods in acceptance with him.

 

“I’m Mark and this is Glenn,” one of the other men says to him and offers his hand for Kyle to shake, which he does.

 

Coop excuses himself to go and deal with the discs Dan had given him earlier and Kyle heads over to the keyboard that had been put out. It was a similar model to his own, so he was used to the layout and button combinations on it.

 

“So you good with the songs man?” Danny asks him as he walks over.

 

“Yeah, yeah, no problem.” Kyle replies. “I knew a couple of them anyway, so as long as we practice them all it should be good.” And the guys look at him as if he is an angel sent from heaven.

 

They practice all four of the songs Kyle is to play in and it goes relatively well. The Irishmen are happy that it sounds good and they don’t have to drop or change anything else. They all grab a drink before Kyle has to head back to the others, and they’re sitting around in garden furniture when the flap to the tent opens and Dan strides in, looking for something.

 

“Hi!” Kyle greets him when he sees him. “Guys, this is Dan, Dan this is Danny, Mark and Glenn.” And points to each man individually as he says his name.

 

Dan wanders over and waves at them as they say hi.

 

“Oh, you’re Dan!” Danny exclaims. “Yeah, you got balls to up and kiss this dude on stage like that man.” And Dan blushes slightly, moving closer to Kyle. Kyle notices and reaches his arm out to hold him around the waist and pull him towards him.

 

“Oh ignore him. He’s just got a big gob,” Mark says to Dan, noticing his slight embarrassment. “Thanks for lending him to us anyway.”

 

“Oh, that’s not a problem. It gets him out of the way for a while,” and they all laugh at that apart from Kyle who pinches Dan’s ass in protest. “We’ve gotta go anyway, we’re about to go on,” Dan adds, and pulls Kyle up and towards the tent opening.

 

“See you later guys,” he calls as he’s dragged out and away.

 

\---

 

Bastille’s set went without a hitch. Coop had managed to get all of the tracks back working and they had no songs to change. Sharon was slightly more nervous this time for some reason and did miss a couple of the notes she was meant to hit, but no one seemed to notice in the crowd. It just reminded Dan to practice a bit more before the next show.

 

Kyle had – somehow – managed to bribe Will into putting confetti and glitter onto the drum that was next to him between songs, so that when Dan went over during Of the Night to hit them, the sparkly pieces were thrown everywhere. The crowd appeared slightly more upset though when Dan didn’t then go on to kiss Kyle at the end.

 

Finishing as normal on Pompeii, the guys all thanked the crowd and head off the stage as one. The equipment guys met them there, and it was decided that they would leave Charlie’s board set up at the back so that Kyle could use it and not be in the way and he then went off to get changed and have a quick drink before having to head back on again.

 

Dan and the rest of the guys decide it is too busy for them to stay backstage, so all of them but Dan decide to head back to the back stage tent for a rest and Dan decides to head into the crowd and watch from there. He grabs himself a pint on the way so he didn’t get thirsty, and finds himself a relatively clear space at the back of everyone, but where he can clearly see the keyboards Kyle would be playing at.

 

A couple of the crowd realise who he is and come up asking for photos, like normal and he obliges happily. The music starts soon after and he is engrossed with the performance of the men he had met earlier on.

 

He doesn’t immediately realise the girl next to him until she moves into him seemingly accidentally.

 

“Oh my goodness! I am so sorry,” he apologises as he spills some of his drink over her. He takes a good look at the girl now. She looked about 16 but she would have to be older to be at this festival as it was adults only. She had long dirty blond hair hanging freely below her shoulders and she had a lot of makeup on her face with face painted flowers down the side of her temple.

 

She was wearing an extremely short dark blue denim shorts, that barely covered her backside and a low cut multi-coloured neon vest top. She giggled when she looked at him.

 

“Don’t apologise, it was me who bumped into you!” she said and took a sip from her own plastic glass. She was drinking something with whipped cream on the top and she sucked it up whilst staring deeply into Dan’s eyes.

 

Sighing and rolling his eyes, Dan just says;

 

“Well have a good night then,” and tries to move away from her. He looks up when there is some cheering and he sees Kyle walking onto the stage and starting the beginning melody for Hall of Fame. He had changed his t-shirt during his break and was now wearing a white wwcomms shirt that he had cut the sleeves off of and turned it into a vest top, which he usually wore in the hotter climates.

 

“I’m Charlene,” the girl tries again, following Dan slightly as he moved.

 

Dan nods as she says it and he just points at himself and then to Kyle on the stage as if to explain he was with him, or listening to them. Anything to get the girl away from him.

 

“Oh, I know who you are, Dan,” the girl says, closing the distance between them. “I know everything about you and Kyle,” she says, creepily like a stalker. “I’ve seen the pictures, I know you’re not together and you just like to have girls chase after you…”

 

Dan stops exactly what he’s doing in that moment and just stares at the girl.

 

“What the hell are you talking about?” he asks her, completely confused and incredulous.

 

The girl pulls out her phone and loads up something on it before showing him the screen and handing him the phone. The phone has twitter loaded up onto it and in the search bar at the top has the term #kjs!=!. Under it is a whole load of photos.

 

Dan recognises the man in the photos as his boyfriend. He was sleeping soundly, mouth open and eyes closed, his moustache slightly mussed up. Next to him was another body. No head in the photo, clearly naked, and her hand over his lover’s torso. He sees the date as being earlier that week.

 

He drops the phone and drops his pint glass – not caring whether the liquid ended up on the mobile or not – and staggered away from the crowd in shock. He starts walking blindly away from the music, completely unaware of what was going on around him. He passes flashing lights and walks directly into people and moves away quickly without even looking at them. Eventually there is a loud grunt and he can’t get away as two arms grab onto his upper arms and hold him in place.

 

“Dan? Dan what’s wrong?” and the man looks up and into the shaggy haired face of his drummer. He continues looking into his face for a number of minutes, just gaping, mouth moving and nothing coming out of it.

 

“Ky…le…” he finally gets out. “Photos?” he says and Woody looks directly into his eyes and pulls him away from the others around him.

 

“C’mon mate,” he says to him. “Let’s talk.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! Another chapter for you. 
> 
> So the songs I was thinking of when writing about Kyle playing for The Script:  
> Hall of Fame - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mk48xRzuNvA  
> Paint the town Green - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_xGbEw8UUU  
> If You Could See Me Now - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SGlkwKA-t_4  
> Superheroes - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WIm1GgfRz6M
> 
> Again, comments and criticisms welcomed x


	18. Chapter 18

Chapter Eighteen

Pulling the singer to a much quieter area, filled with wooden tables and chairs, Woody deposits Dan into an empty seat and heads over to the bar area to grab a drink. He looks back at him when walking and just sees him staring directly ahead at the table, barely moving at all.

 

This is what Woody had been worried about when Kyle told him what had happened. That Dan would find out some other way and he would be completely broken up about it. He wasn’t sure exactly what Dan had seen, but he would find out and then point him in the direction of his clueless boyfriend.

 

He gets a couple of pints and a shot of vodka and carries the drinks on a round black tray back to the table. He places the shot in front of the dark haired man and tells him to drink up, hoping it would calm his nerves and help with the shock.

 

The light around them was dimming. Despite it being late into the evening by this time, the sun was still setting on the horizon, giving the illusion of pinks and reds around them. They could both hear the music from the stage and Dan was thinking about how Kyle was playing away, completely oblivious to the hurt he was currently suffering.

 

“Dan, you’ve gotta tell me what happened mate.” The drummer finally says after giving the spirit enough time to do its magic and calm the other man down.

 

“Some girl came on to me and when I gave her the brush off she showed me these photos of Kyle in bed with a girl on twitter.” Dan gives the cliff notes version before pulling out his own phone and loading up the app. He typed the hashtag into the search bar and the photos came up instantly. Not wanting to look at them any longer than necessary he shoves the phone quickly towards Woody.

 

Taking the iPhone, Woody swipes down the screen to see exactly what the feed was about. He saw the photos, but knowing what Kyle had told him, he could see straight away that the man was completely comatose and in no fit state for anything. He has a quick look at the tweets that were going along with them.

 

_@kjs!=! – so this happened to me at the weekend!_

_@veritybas – OMG! Is that who I think it is?_

_@kjs!=! – yes! Kyle is not as gay as he likes to make out! #kjs!=!_

 

And then there are a number of messages explaining what was happening between Kyle and Dan, how it was all a charade for publicity, and that they were notoriously into women and girls chasing after them and flirting. It eventually gives tips on how to get them into bed.

 

“Mate have you read any of these?” Woody asks the singer and gives a rundown of the whole conversation.

 

“No, I kinda saw the photos and bolted. But the photos don’t lie Wood. He’s clearly been with someone else hasn’t he? Maybe this is all he sees us as? Something to get publicity for the band?” Dan says quietly. Woody can see the glistening of tears in his eyes, and as he watches Dan blink, the first start rolling down his cheeks.

 

Woody takes a deep breath before saying what he knew he had to.

 

“Dan, Kyle didn’t sleep with any girls.”

 

“How would you know, have in depth talks about your love lives now do you?” Dan scoffs. He doesn’t mean it to be cruel, but he’s hurting.

 

“You’d be surprised,” Woody retorts. “No, Kyle…” he starts, and has to take a second to decide whether telling Dan was the right thing to do. Deciding to change tactics, he starts again.

 

“OK, well you know this whole Ella fancying Kyle thing?” he says and Dan nods slowly, not seeing where this could be going. “Well, you know when you couldn’t find him at Ella’s party and you ended up going home on your own?”

 

Dan looked a bit confused at that point. He couldn’t remember much of that night at all. He barely remembers getting home and the only thing he does remember is losing Kyle at some point. He tells Woody this as well.

 

Woody stares at him for a few moments, cogs turning in his head. If Kyle had been drugged, what would have stopped Dan being drugged as well? Dan wasn’t good with alcohol, but he rarely forgets what he’s doing when he is drunk.

 

“Well,” Woody decided to continue, “Kyle told me in confidence the other day that he had been drugged and he ended up waking up in with this girl the next morning with absolutely no clue as to what had happened, but he was positive he hadn’t slept with her.”

 

Woody watches Dan’s face goes from upset, to confused to angry in the space of about three seconds. “What do you mean ‘positive he hadn’t slept with her’?” he asks, tersely.

 

“He was certain since he had been drugged that he couldn’t have had sex, and he said he was too horny the following day to have done anything that night.” He explains as factually as possible.

 

“Did he say who had drugged him? Or who the girl was?” Dan asks, almost too calmly. Woody looks at him, trying to gauge whether what he says next is a good idea or not.

 

“He says he knows, but maybe you should ask him about it Dan.” He decides to err on the side of caution.

 

“Did he tell you?” He asks, and Woody just nods slowly. “Tell me Woody. Who the hell drugged my boyfriend to sleep with him?” his voice getting louder, as he gets more frustrated.

 

Woody takes a long drink of his pint. He looks around them. They’re still relatively alone, and the sun has almost disappeared completely from the sky. Neon lights are sparkling around them and flaming torches light the way back to the stage area. He puts his drink down in front of him, plays with the glass for a second and takes a deep breath.

 

“Ella.” He says finally. “Ella drugged Kyle to get him into bed.”

 

Neither of the men say anything for what feels like the longest time. Dan just stares open mouthed at his friend and Woody just keeps staring at his drink, praying for the silence to end and for him to get out of this awkward situation.

 

“I’m sorry,” Dan says chuckling lightly. “Did you say Ella?”

 

Woody looks up at him then, thinking maybe something had clicked in Dan’s head and he had lost the plot somehow.

 

“My baby sister, Ella?” He clarifies, and Woody just nods at him. “My baby sister drugged my boyfriend to sleep with him?” Dan asks out loud, his volume getting higher and tone more disbelieving as he spoke.

 

Woody looks around again to make sure no one is paying attention to what is going on. Thankfully they are the only people in the area.

 

“Dan, dude, maybe tone it down a bit?” Woody pleads with him.

 

“Tone it down? TONE IT DOWN?” he ends up shouting. “I’m not gonna fucking tone it down! I’m gonna tear my sister a new one and then I’m gonna move onto Kyle!” he rages at the drummer, and he stands up out of his chair and the seat falls backwards. He ignores the mess he’s making and he starts to walk away.

 

Woody gets up and runs after him, grabbing onto his arm to try and stop him. Dan just shrugs his arm off forcefully and turns to glare at him.

 

“Don’t Woody. Just don’t,” he says dead straight into the man’s eyes. Woody shivers slightly. He had never seen Dan this angry and he had known him longest out of them all. He was livid and could do anything in this moment, but there was no way Woody was going to be able to stop him.

 

\---

 

Dan storms back into his hotel room, having gotten a taxi back from the festival. There was no way he was going to wait for any of the others, and he had an important phone call to make.

 

He pulls his phone out and rings his sister’s phone. It rings twice before she answers it.

 

“Hey Dan, are you alright?” Ella says down the phone to him.

 

“Are you with mum and dad?” He asks slowly and steadily as he could, feeling his anger boiling within him.

 

“Uh, yeah,” she replies confused.

 

“Go to your room. Now.” Dan orders down the phone, icily. He had never spoken to her this way before, but it was taking all of his composure not to scream down the mouthpiece at her. He can hear her say something to his parents and then muffling noises as she heads through to her bedroom.

 

“Alright, I’m here,” she says as Dan can hear the door closing in the background.

 

“WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK ELLA?” Dan yells down the phone at her, almost in exactly the same way Kyle had said it to her at the weekend. “Drugging Kyle? Are you fucking kidding me?”

 

“What are you talking about?” Ella tries, her voice cracking and breaking as she says it, Dan knowing this was just a token denial.

 

“I’ve seen the pictures Ella,” he says to her, and he hears her gasp on the other end of the phone. “Why do you need him huh? Why did you feel the need to do this?” he asks her, still shouting.

 

“No…it’s not like that…really,” she stutters down the phone.

 

“Oh really? Then tell me Ella, what is it like? Are you still texting him?” He demands of her. She goes quiet at the end of the phone. “Oh my god, you are aren’t you?! This is ridiculous! Ella, he loves me! He is into men! And you’re half his age!” he takes a breath and he can hear her sobbing down the phone.

 

“Don’t be a stupid little girl Ella. You wanted to be treated like a grown up? Take the consequences like a champ! Go and be a little whore somewhere else, but never speak to me again alright?” and he hangs up on the girl, throwing his phone across the room.

 

He takes a deep breath and balls his hands into fists and brings them to grab at his own hair. He screams in frustration and anger until he runs out of steam and slumps onto the bed.

 

He glares at the door as he hears the swipe of a card and the lock opening. As the door opens he steels himself for the confrontation about to happen.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologise if I use any twitter handles already being used! It is not on purpose please believe me!  
> Next chapter should be up soon...
> 
> Please comment if you feel inclined. xx


	19. Chapter 19

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OK Guys. So there is some violence in this chapter. It is not sustained, but if it triggers anything, please be warned. 
> 
> Please also be aware of the tags in this and if anything might trigger you please be warned. 
> 
> Hope you all enjoy.

Chapter Nineteen

Kyle walks onto the stage at the beginning of the set feeling very out of place standing behind Charlie’s keyboards and at the back of the stage. He looks out at the crowd and while he can normally see a lot of the fans where he normally stands, all he can see at that moment is lights and blurs behind them. He knows that Dan is somewhere in the crowd and this eases his anxiety somewhat.

 

He is the first person to play on the stage for Hall of Fame, and he knows that he knows the music but the fear of forgetting everything is eating at him. He manages to make it through the song. He watches the others perform from the corner of his eye, and notices that the way they perform is so different to Dan. There’s no awkward dancing, or obvious self-deprecation and he misses his partner’s obvious glee at being on stage.

 

During the songs he doesn’t have to play in he has chance to relax. He doesn’t leave the stage though, but he does have a chair behind him so he sits on that with one leg up and his knee bent and he hugs his leg as the Irishmen continue. Someone had left him a cup of tea on the table next to him, so he settles in and drinks that until he’s needed.

 

Just before the last song, Danny comes over to him and points him out to the crowd.

 

“So, just so you know, this guy here is amazing and stepped in at the last minute to help us out!” And the crowd screams back at him. “This is Kyle from Bastille, if you were here earlier you would have seen him!” and the crowd screams louder as he continues to talk. “And going for a bit of self-promotion here as well Kyle!” and the crowd laughs as his Bastille t-shirt is pointed out.

 

“Uh yeah…Wild World, buy it, and Glory out soon!” he says jovially down the microphone, and Danny laughs and walks away to start the final song.

 

After the set has finished and they all walk off, Danny quickly comes up to him to say thanks again. “Oh, and if you ever need a job, let us know yeah?” he says, half-jokingly and walks away with Kyle feeling very confused.

 

He heads out and tries to find where everyone else has gone. He gets a lift back to the tent where everyone was congregating, and finds Coop and Will chatting about something. He asks where Dan is and they say they haven’t seen him, so he continues to walk around looking for his boyfriend. Finally deciding to wait for him there, he heads over to the bar to order a drink to relax with.

 

Waiting to be served in the crowd, someone comes rushing over to him and pulls him out of the throng of people.

 

“Go back to the hotel,” Woody says to him, urgently.

 

“Huh?” Kyle replies, clearly confused.

 

“Go back to the hotel and talk to Dan. Now.” He says again, in a voice that made Kyle believe that it would be a stupid thing to ignore him. He shoves his wallet back into his pocket and heads out of the tent.

 

“Is he alright?” he asks as he’s walking.

 

“Just go back now,” is all Woody says, wanting to rid himself of all responsibility of whatever it was that was upsetting him, and Kyle heads out to find a taxi in the queue that had amassed at the entrance to the festival.

 

\---

 

He gets in the lift and travels up to the fourth floor and walks quickly down to the door of their room. He swipes the key card and opens the door and sees Dan sitting on the bed facing the door as he enters.

 

“God, is everything OK? Woody practically forced me into the taxi to come back here! What’s ha-“ and he is stopped mid-sentence by a sudden sharp pain to his jaw and he reflexively throws his hand up to his mouth.

 

He hadn’t noticed in his rambling that Dan had stood up, taken four quick steps towards him to punch him square in the face. Kyle looks round at him completely shocked and wide eyed. He looks directly at Dan and sees the anger and fury in his eyes. He’s flexing the fingers on his right hand and looks like he wants to cradle it because of pain, but is trying too hard to stand his ground.

 

“What the hell, Dan?” Kyle shouts at him, still in shock.

 

“Well that didn’t make me feel any better,” Dan says icily, and moves back to the bed to sit back down. Kyle, still confused just stands by the door waiting for an explanation.

 

“Dan what the hell was that for?” he asks again, and Dan looks him full square in the face.

 

“Sleeping with my sister.” Dan says. He knows it isn’t true, but he wants to see Kyle’s reaction to it anyway. The words have the desired effect. Kyle drops his hand from his face and both arms fall limply at his sides as his face pales immediately, the redness from the punch now visible under his beard.

 

There’s silence for a number of minutes while the two men look at each other, before Kyle sighs.

 

“I didn’t sleep with her Dan,” he says slowly. He doesn’t want to come out and furiously deny it. It’s not what Dan wants him to do. He can see it in his eyes that he wants the truth.

 

“Then what the fuck happened, Kyle?”

 

“I woke up the day after the party with no idea what had happened. She was naked next to me and I was naked, but I had the worst headache ever and couldn’t remember anything after the karaoke.” He says quickly, feeling the need to now tell his lover everything.

 

“Is that why you had that panic attack that afternoon?” Dan asks him, voice still stony and angry. Kyle just nods at the question in confirmation. “Why the fuck didn’t you tell me any of this?” he demands from him.

 

“I was ashamed at first. I couldn’t remember it and I was angry with myself.” Kyle tries to explain. “Then I spoke to Tasha and she said that nothing could have happened if I was drugged and that all made sense to me,” he carries on. “So I didn’t want to say anything until I had spoken to Ella to find out, and then I didn’t want you to know what she had done.” He finally finishes. “I didn’t want you to think of your sister that way.” He adds quietly.

 

“You had no right to keep this from me!” Dan suddenly explodes. “Not only was it you, but it was my baby sister! I deserved to know!” he shouts at the other man. Kyle says nothing. He knows that Dan is right, and he has no excuses now.

 

“Not only that Kyle – NOT ONLY THAT!” he rails on, “THERE’S PHOTOS OF IT!” he screams, standing up and advancing on Kyle aggressively. Kyle automatically gets away from the door, instinct kicking in and trying to get to where he felt a bit safer. He wasn’t scared of Dan. Dan wasn’t a violent man, but the way he was at that moment could lead to anything.

 

“Photos?” Kyle asks, trying to stay as calm as possible.

 

“Yeah, Simmons, fucking photos, of my naked baby sister and my boyfriend on twitter and ways that girls can hit on us!” he hissed. “Not only have you destroyed us and my relationship with my sister, you’ve pissed on the band! How could you? Why didn’t you just tell me?” He demands from the man.

 

Again more silence as Kyle now sinks onto the bed with his head in his hands. He can’t believe how stupid he’s been.

 

“And the worst thing? It’s not the first time this month you’ve kept something from me Kyle!” Dan continues on, seriously hurt now as he remembers Kyle breaking up with him because of another secret.

 

“I know alright!” bursts from Kyle, surprising Dan out of his anger for a second. “I’m an idiot alright! I know this!” He shouts.

 

“Oh no! You don’t get to feel sorry for yourself about this! OK, you got drugged and I’m seriously pissed off with her for that, but you should have told me! Haven’t you learned anything?!” Dan shouts back suddenly.

 

“Dan, no, I’m not feeling sorry for myself!” Kyle tries to explain. ‘It’s just…it’s just easier to bury your head in the sand sometimes, y’know?”

 

“Oh don’t you fucking dare quote my own words to me right now,” Dan scoffs at him. Kyle’s eyes go wide open as he realises what he’s said.

 

“Dan, for fucks sake, you don’t have a monopoly on metaphors yeah?” Kyle fights back suddenly. “Look, I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. But at the same time I was _drugged_! And if there’s photos out there, I didn’t consent to them! So _I was violated_! I LOVE YOU DANIEL SMITH! This wasn’t done on purpose, and I was trying to protect you. Sorry for that I really am!” Kyle finally bursts, and he balls his fists in his hair as he finishes and doesn’t know what else to say.

 

The room goes silent as the men think about everything that had been said between them. The silence is deafening, and there is ringing in both of the men’s ears from the constant yelling and screaming between them. Kyle puts his hand to his mouth and looks at his fingers, seeing a slight stain of blood on them. He gets up and heads into the bathroom to have a look at his lip and wash his face.

 

He comes back out after a few minutes and Dan has moved over to the bed and covered himself completely. He’s turned the bedside light out and has his eyes screwed shut. Kyle takes this as the end of the discussion and crawls into bed next to him. He rolls on his side with his back to his lover and they stay like that for the entire night.

 

\---

 

Morning comes and the two men get up without talking to each other and pack their things quickly. They head to reception and check out and get taken to the airport for their flight to the next country. No one either noticed or mentioned the stony silence between them and no one said anything when Dan sat at the front of the bus with Coop and Kyle sat on his own with his headphones in.

 

They arrived at the airport to check in for their flight to Austria, and Kyle notices that Dan has disappeared while they are queueing with all of their kit. He watches him walk back towards the group with a look of shock on his face and holding his mobile in his left hand. Kyle looks at it and selfishly feels elated that Dan is still wearing his ring. This only lasts a second when he looks up at the singer’s eyes and sees guilt there.

 

Kyle moves towards Coop, Will and Woody to find out what’s happened whilst trying to catch Dan’s eyes to silently ask him. Dan purposefully avoids all eye contact with him.

 

“I’ve got to go home,” is all he says to the group of men looking at him.

 

“What do you mean?” Will asks him clearly worried himself.

 

“Ella’s in the hospital. She’s taken an overdose.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again for reading xx


	20. Chapter 20

Chapter Twenty

“Ella’s in the hospital. She’s taken an overdose.”

 

The group is silent for a moment. Kyle just gapes at Dan not sure whether he had heard him right. When he sees the singer almost collapse in front of him, he bursts into action. He grabs Dan’s arm and pulls him over to the nearest seat, with very little protest from the man. He sits him down and crouches down in front of him, putting his hands on his thighs and trying to get him to look directly at him.

 

“Dan, look at me Dan.” he says and dips his head to catch his eye. Dan’s clearly in shock, his eyes unfocused on anything and his mouth just hanging open. Finally, he seems to hear Kyle’s voice and just looks into his brown eyes.

 

“Kyle?” He asks, still not really with it.

 

“Yeah, it’s me. Do you want me to make decisions for you, or do you want to do it?” He can see the man is seconds away from panic and he knows from experience that if someone doesn’t take over from him he’ll break spectacularly. Dan doesn’t say anything; he just points at Kyle. Kyle takes that as his answer, and squeezes Dan’s knee in support and stands up, his knees creaking and cracking as he does.

 

“Alright then. Coop, can you ring Dave? Let him know we have to cancel Austria. I don’t know about the others. He might have to make a call until we let him know what’s going on. You guys head out today anyway, grab the bus and the truck and load everything up. We don’t want to be in a mess if we’re back on in a few days yeah?” He takes a big breath and looks at Will and Woody who’s come over to join them. “Will you guys sit with him and keep him calm? I’m gonna go and sort out tickets.”

 

He walks over to Dan who is still sitting looking forward at where Kyle had been. Kyle crouches down again and rubs his leg to get his attention.

 

“Babe, give me your passport?” he asks gently. The pet name slips out, but Dan doesn’t flinch. He just reaches into his pocket and pulls out the red book and hands it to him. He gets up again, audibly groaning this time and heads over to the departures board to find the next flight leaving to Gatwick.

 

Heading over to the ticket desk for the airline, he notices Tom heading towards him with the camera.

 

“Not right now Tom, yeah?” He says to him the filmmaker turns the camera off before he even gets to him.

 

“Everything alright?” He asks, genuinely concerned.

 

“Just more drama that’s all. I’m beginning to be suspicious of days without it to be honest with you.”

 

\---

He gets the two of them on to the next flight out to Gatwick. He never actually checked whether it was alright with the singer if he came with him, but there was no way he was going to let him fly alone so he would have to deal with it. Dave was notably pissed off that they were having to cancel a gig, and Kyle really wasn’t surprised. He wanted to get his money’s worth from them before they inevitably dropped him as their manager at the end of the summer, and he didn’t care about Dan’s family or how stressed the singer currently was.

 

The flight to London was leaving an hour before the one to Austria, so the two of them boarded the flight after saying goodbye to the rest of the group. Dan had gained the function of speech again and was quietly saying thanks to people and that he would let them know what was going on. He had gone back to ignoring Kyle again, much to the younger man’s displeasure, but he would still keep an eye on him.

 

Having to fly EasyJet to get home, they didn’t have assigned seats, so they boarded the plane and Dan immediately chose a single seat with no spaces around it. He didn’t even glance at Kyle as he passed to get to the next empty seat, a few rows further back. It wasn’t until they were an hour into the flight that Kyle eventually gets up to go and speak to him. The plane wasn’t built to accommodate a lot of people in the aisles, so he chose his moment after the stewards had passed with the food cart. He unbuckles his seat belt and quickly scoots to crouch next to the aisle seat his boyfriend was sitting in.

 

“How are you feeling?” He asks Dan, touching his arm lightly as he talks to get his attention. Dan jumps when he feels the touch and looks round at him. He has his headphones on and he pulls them off his head and rolls his eyes when he looks at Kyle.

 

“Seriously I thought me sitting here and ignoring you would send you a message Kyle,” he whispers quietly to the man. The large businessman in the middle seat was paying too much attention to him to talk normally.

 

“Dan, look I know you’re pissed at me right now, but I’m here to support you yeah? You don’t trust me, I get that, but I’m gonna show you that you can.” He leans forward and whispers in his ear, so quickly Dan can’t do anything about it, “I love you, Dan,” and he plants a light kiss on the other man’s kiss, before quickly making his way back to his seat as he sees the trolley coming back towards him.

 

Dan looks quickly behind him to see Kyle scooching into his seat and buckling his belt again before looking back at him. He turns back to the front again quickly, mentally kicking himself for softening on the man. He was still extremely pissed off with him, but he did have a point the previous night saying he was also a victim in what happened.

 

He goes to put his headphones back over his ears and try and get some sleep before landing, when the man next to him puts his hand over his, softly. Dan’s eyes widen and looks at his hand and then up at the man, who actually winks at him.

 

“If you’re not interested in him, I can get a hotel room when we land…” and he doesn’t end the proposition. Dan immediately pulls his hand away from the arm rest, pulls his headphones over his ears and turns his music up very loud before folding his arms to keep all of his body as far away from the middle seat as possible.

 

\---

 

Landing and getting out of the airport was easy. They had left their luggage with the group so they only had their hand luggage so they head up to the multi-story to get Dan’s car. Dan still hadn’t said anything to Kyle since the flight and Kyle was starting to babble almost extremely, to the point of just saying what he was looking at. Dan was having an extremely hard time trying to tune him out and caught himself almost giggling at a few things that the man had said.

 

They got to the Audi and threw their bags in the boot of the car. Dan goes to walk round to the driver’s side and Kyle just stands in front of him and blocks him. He has his hand out in front of him and looks directly at Dan.

 

“What?” Dan finally says to him, not being able to ignore this.

 

“Keys.” Is all Kyle says to him. Dan looks at him with raised eyebrows and laughs rudely.

 

“Uh, no. You don’t get to drive this.” He says emphatically. He was extremely proud of his car and has only let one other person drive it other than him.

 

“Dan, you’re still in shock. You aren’t driving. It’s motorways the whole way – it’s like my kind of trip.” He says and looks at him again, still with his hand out. “I’m not moving til you give me the keys Dan.” He says firmly. Dan looks at him again, and really didn’t want to analyze the things that stern voice was doing to his insides at that moment. He does eventually give the keys to Kyle and he gets in the passenger seat. Pulling out of the car park, Dan sets the sat nav for the man to follow and they start on their silent journey.

 

The music starts playing after Dan selects the playlist to use and Kyle notices that there are clearly a number of songs that Dan knew for a fact that Kyle couldn’t stand. He gives the other man the side eye and sees his nonchalantly looking out of the window at the passing scenery.

 

“Fuck sake dude?” Kyle finally says as the next song comes on. “Cheryl fucking Cole?”

 

“I like it.” Dan says defiantly, and Kyle raises his eyebrows at him and shakes his head.

 

It takes another half an hour before Dan himself gets fed up with the crappy music he was playing and changes the list to ones that they both enjoyed. The first song that was played was the Connells ’74-75’ and Kyle found himself singing along to it as he was driving. He never really sang a lot in front of the others, not being overly proud of his voice, but he did sing with Dan – and had to for the band anyway.

 

He loved this song. It made him think of Dan, and it was the song that he constantly played on repeat when he was secretly pining over the man before the whole affair started. The next song was an electro-pop classic from the 80’s which Kyle also loved. SO much so he actually had it as his ringtone on his phone. It wasn’t until the next song was played that Kyle realized the playlist that Dan was playing. The final song was Fast Car by Tracy Chapman and was the song that Kyle had sung when he first joined the band. Kyle looks over at Dan and he can see that he is sitting silently looking directly at the road and has red rimmed eyes.

 

“Dan, don’t cry.” Kyle says quietly.

 

“I’m not fucking crying Kyle.” Dan snaps back at him, and Kyle closes his mouth before he can say anything else. “I’m just so angry with both of you.” He says after a few moments. There really is nothing that Kyle can say to that, so he keeps his eyes on the road and keeps driving the route mapped out for him.

 

Dan watches him for a few moments and sees Kyle let go of the wheel with his left hand and try and stretch his fingers out. He sees the wince of pain in the other man’s face when doing it, and reaches out to touch his hand, before realizing he’s meant to be angry. Kyle notices the small gesture and just smiles at him.

 

“It’s fine. Finger’s a bit sore is all. I’ll ask for something when we get to the hospital.” He explains.

 

Finally, after 5 hours of travelling, Kyle pulls into the hospital carpark. He tells the parking attendant he’s heading into Accident and Emergency – where Ella was staying on their short stay ward – and pulls into an empty space. Both of the men getting out of the car, they stretch loudly and hear plenty of pops coming from their joints. They follow the large red signs towards Accident and Emergency and head into the relatively newly built hospital.

 

Walking into the waiting room, Kyle tells Dan to get a seat and heads over to the reception desk. There is a young man behind the desk in a green polo short. He looks mid-twenties and he looks weary with his job. He looks up at Kyle as he approaches the desk and simply asks him what he can do for him.

 

“Uhm, my friend’s sister was brought in today and she’s on your short stay ward? Ella Smith?”

 

“OK, so is it just you and her brother that’s here?” the guy asks and Kyle just nods as he looks back at Dan sitting in one of the uncomfortable plastic seats. “Well, I’ll give them a ring and someone will come out and get you,” the man says helpfully and smiles at Kyle as he thanks him and walks back to sit down.

 

They sit in a slightly more comfortable silence for a while before the large wooden doors open and they look up to see Dan’s mother holding them open. As she notices Dan, Dan stands up and walks quickly over to her and hugs her tightly. Kyle runs over to take the door from her so she can reciprocate the embrace.

 

Mrs. Smith looks exhausted. Her face is red and blotchy and she had clearly been crying for a long time. She grasps Kyle’s upper arm in appreciation and smiles when she sees him holding the door and starts to walk back into the department. The walk down a long corridor with doors on both sides of then and then turn right through a larger area full of cubicles and patients. Ahead of them was another pair of doors with a large sign declaring ‘Observation Unit’ over the top and she pulls the doors open into it.

 

They walk in and immediately see a large desk with a slim blond nurse sitting behind it and what appeared to be six doors into individual rooms. The unit was relatively dark, there was no windows in any of the room and only one of the rooms had a light on. Dan gets pulled towards the room with the light on and looks at Kyle as he goes.

 

“I’ll just stay out here and wait for a bit,” he says awkwardly to Dan and the other man just nods in agreement. Kyle looks over at the nurse sitting behind the desk. He points to the low – obviously redundant – desk that he was standing next to. “Can I sit on this?” he asks and the nurse smiles and nods at him. He puts his hand back and pushes up on the desk at the same time as jumping and slowly lowers himself down on it.

 

“Is she doing OK?” he asks the nurse after a few moments of silence and he’s fully taken time to absorb his surroundings.

 

“She’s good.” The nurse replies. “Is that her brother in there?” Kyle just nods and chews on his lower lip, feeling the hair rubbing against the opposite one. “And you are?” the nurse asks him.

 

“Family friend,” is all that Kyle says. The nurse nods at him.

 

“Do you want a coffee or anything?” she asks him kindly.

 

“Uhm, nah, I’m alright at the moment, thanks. Oh, but do you have any Cavlon?” he asks her, clearly stunning the nurse at his knowledge of the barrier cream. She looks at him confused. He shows her his finger, “new tattoo, needs something on it,” he says and chuckles at his stupidity. The nurse slides out through a door behind her and comes back in a couple of moments later with umber of sachets of the barrier cream.

 

“Don’t tell them I gave it to you,” she says to him conspiratorially. He laughs quickly.

 

“Thanks…?”

 

“Gill,” the woman says to him.

 

“Cool, thanks Gill. I’m Kyle,” he introduces himself.

 

“I know,” is all the nurse says to him, smiling kindly and goes back to her paperwork.

 

\---

 

Mr. and Mrs. Smith come out after about ten minutes in there and tell Kyle they are going to Costa for coffee, and that Dan and Ella were both asking for him. Kyle smiles politely at him and steels himself for what will happen when he walks through the door.

 

He walks in and shuts the door behind him. There is not window in the room, but a door to what must be a private bathroom. The walls are painted a battleship grey and there is a window out onto the desk with the nurse behind it. Ella is lying on a very old hospital bed, and is wearing her pyjamas. She has a needle in the back of her hand hooked up to a drip of some sort. He looks at the pump and sees that there is about 10 hours left on it so she would be in the ward for a little while longer.

 

As he walks in Ella’s eyes are cast downward, not looking at either of the men. Dan is sitting in another plastic chair with his arms and legs crossed facing his sister. Kyle chooses one at the other side of the bed and waits for whatever was to come.

 

“Tell me why.” Dan finally says. It’s not a question, more of an order and Ella looks up at him when he says it.

 

“Because I felt that I had nothing and you had everything and the one thing I wanted more than anything you had.” She says simply. It was in that moment that Kyle could see that Ella was still a child, no matter what bravado or pretense she put on to the rest of the world.

 

“But Ella, I didn’t think of you like that. Even if I wasn’t with Dan I wouldn’t have ever thought of you like that. You’re far too young for me,” Kyle explains to her. She looks over at him and she nods slowly.

 

“Where did you get the idea for the drugs?” Dan asks, his voice softer now.

 

“A friend told me I should do it. That if it happened you would realise that I wasn’t some kid and we would be together. And she said if I took photos then you would never doubt it had happened. But I wasn’t going to do anything with the pictures, Kyle, I swear! I have no idea how they got out!” Kyle can feel the anger boiling up inside of him when he hears that.

 

“So what happened last night?”

 

“After you rang I called my friend to find out what I should do and to say that the photos had gotten out. She said that I was stupid and immature and of course this was going to happen. I got really upset and I couldn’t think of another way out…this was my only choice really.” And she bursts into tears, the full weight of what she had done finally coming to rest on her shoulders.

 

Kyle and Dan look at each other, not knowing what to do. Kyle didn’t want to do anything that would make her think about him in that way again, and Dan was still too angry to comfort his sister. Finally, Dan sighs as the crying continues and moves out of his seat to the edge of the bed and sits down to put his arm around her shoulder.

 

“Which friend?” Dan asks, his voice steady, but when Kyle looks at him he can see the same anger he had been faced with the previous night.

 

“Sharon’s mum. Margaret.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi all. Links for today
> 
> The Connells - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l-ITv4OBV9c  
> Fast Car - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DwrHwZyFN7M  
> Electro pop song was actually To Cut a Long Story Short by Spandau Ballet - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JE2sCISQmpE
> 
> Hope everyone liked. Please stay with me! xx


	21. Chapter 21

Chapter Twenty One

Throwing the room door open, Dan storms through it as quickly as he can. The stony look on his face has made way for complete fury now and he was willing to go and destroy the first thing he came into contact with. He can’t believe the nerve of that woman to use his sister like this and to top it all off make her feel the only way out of it was to try and kill herself.

 

He rushes into the corridor of the observation unit, startling Gill behind the desk and starts pacing quickly up and down. He can still hear Ella sobbing quietly in the room he has just left and he can hear deep murmuring before Kyle comes out to find him.

 

“It’s alright Gill, really,” he can hear Kyle saying to the nurse behind the desk. “He’s just gotten some bad news is all,” he explains quickly. The nurse eyes the singer, obviously assessing him for some sort of risk to herself and to Ella.

 

“Maybe it would be best if he got some air?” She says diplomatically, and Kyle nods at her and walks over to Dan, still pacing furiously. He places a light touch on his elbow, stopping him instantly in his tracks. Dan looks at his arm and then up into the gaze of his – boyfriend? Ex?

 

“C’mon Smith,” he says gently. “Let’s get out of here for a minute yeah?” and gripping softly at his arm he starts to pull him through the double doors and out of the unit. Gill eases as they leave her behind and heads in to the room to make sure Ella is OK.

 

As they walk out they pass by Dan’s parents coming back in. They had obviously been in and out enough times that day that the reception staff knew who they were. Dan shrugs off Kyle’s hand and walks off ahead of him. They gape at the angry look on their son’s face as he marches past, not paying them any heed, and look questioningly at Kyle as he follows. Kyle opens his mouth to say something, but with the speed Dan is going he can’t stop to explain. He is left to just shrug his shoulders apologetically and races after the dark haired man who was currently trying to break the land speed record.

 

Kyle catches up to him, finally, outside the doors into the A&E department, where he seems to have run out of steam and is just standing with his forehead pressed against the wall next to some hideous painting put up for decoration. He walks over to him and gently puts a hand on his shoulder, feeling Dan startle at the sudden touch.

 

Neither of them say anything for the longest time, and people glare at them strangely as the pass them, going about their business. Kyle looks around the hallway to see what else was nearby. He could smell coffee and hear noises but he wasn’t sure if he was just imagining it. He turns behind him, hand still on Dan’s shoulder and sees a sign for a café pointing through the corridor to their right. He squeezes the singer’s shoulder and leans into his ear.

 

“C’mon Dan, let’s go and get coffee yeah?” and he sees Dan shiver slightly as he whispers. He hates himself, but feels elated at the way he can still elicit that kind of reaction from him.

 

Dan seems to think for a beat before pulling himself away from the wall and looking around for the caffeine he needed. He follows Kyle in the direction the sign is pointing in and when they get round the corner they find the Costa Coffee right in front of them, with a closed WH Smith next to it. Thankfully the café was 24 hours, so was open for them. Kyle leads Dan over to one of the small two seater tables with the leather arm chairs and deposits him in it before walking over the counter to queue in the small line that had formed, mainly of the evening hospital staff.

 

He stands in the queue, staring at the cakes on display. He lets his mind try and settle for a minute while he waits to give his order. This Margaret was getting far too out of control for her own good. He had a good theory that she was probably the one who had put those photos on twitter, but he had no idea how to prove any of it. The fact she had manipulated Ella into doing what she had was far and away the one of the lowest things she could have done and if it wasn’t for needing to make sure Dan didn’t do anything stupid he would have already driven over to her house and made quite a scene.

 

Finally reaching the tills, he asks for their usual orders and hands over two flapjacks to eat as well. He had finally realised they hadn’t eaten anything that day and that wouldn’t help anything either.

 

He carries the tray back over to Dan, who looked a little bit more ‘with it’ and places the coffee in front of him with the tray bake. He looks up at Kyle, a little startled, not expecting him to have gotten anything other than a normal coffee.

 

“Don’t look at me like that Dan, please. I told you I’m gonna prove myself.” He says as he removes the tray from the table and settles himself down opposite him. “Tell me what you’re thinking?” he asks him.

 

Dan just plays with the cup of his coffee for a minute before opening his snack and pulling a piece off of it and throwing it in his mouth. He finishes his mouthful before looking back up at Kyle.

 

“I’m thinking about how I’m gonna make good on my promise to the bitch.” He says simply. Kyle looks into the blue eyes looking at him and sees a determination in them he wasn’t sure he had ever seen before.

 

“What promise?” Kyle finally asks, too intrigued to let it go.

 

“I told her to stop attacking us. She knew what would happen if she did.” He takes a long drink from his coffee, seemingly not caring that it was going to be too hot for him.

 

“You gonna tell me what that thing might be?” Kyle tries again. “I’m not gonna let you do this alone you know.”

 

Dan really looks at him then. He sees the worry etched into the man’s younger features. He can see the start of the bruise forming around his mouth underneath the dark brown facial hair and guilt tugs inside him for doing that to him.

 

“Kyle,” he says softly. “I don’t know what you want from me? I don’t trust you. _At all_. And I don’t know if I can be with someone I don’t trust.” He finishes, and he sees the moment Kyle’s heart breaks at the words.

 

Kyle brings his hand up to his mouth and rubs his beard while swallowing hard. Dan sees the healing font on his ring finger and then he glances down at his own ring on his hand. He finds himself twirling it around his finger with his thumb, feeling comfort in the smooth, cool metal he feels. He watches Kyle slowly start to nod as his words sink in.

 

“I’m an idiot,” Kyle finally says to him. “I fuck everything up, and I knew I would fuck this up and I did. Uhm, I guess I’ll finish up the gigs we’ve got booked, but I’ll be out of your hair after all that.” Fully resigned to the outcome of this, he had always known that if the thing with him and Dan ended he would have to leave the group as well. There was no way he would be able to carry on with him. It was bad enough after what happened the previous month.

 

Kyle’s words hit Dan like a ton of bricks. It was one thing to say the words, but knowing that Kyle was taking them to heart and would actually leave him was something else completely.

 

He had been in love with Kyle ever since he first saw him at that house party. Finding out he could be his friend and colleague had been enough for so long, but when Kyle was finally single and admitted he liked him too…Dan’s life was complete. He knew he had found the one person that he would be able to be happy with and he didn’t want anyone else. Yes, he had lied to him – a lie of omission was still a lie – and that had upset him. But he hadn’t actually done anything with anyone else. He stares deeply into the expressive brown eyes in front of him, and sees that Kyle is about to move and get up. His hand darts out to hold onto the fingers of the other man and he grips tightly.

 

“But…I want to try,” he says to him and Kyle gapes at him and falls back down into the seat.

 

“What?” falls out of Kyle’s mouth. He can’t believe what he heard, and he needs Dan to explain before he officially thinks he’s going crazy.

 

“Yes, I’m pissed off, and I don’t trust you, but Kyle I love you too much and I want us to work this out. Us splitting up will just give her what she wants, and the last thing I want to do is make her happy about anything.” He tries to explain. “And that makes it sound as if I’m doing it to spite her doesn’t it?” he asks smiling to himself when he realises what he’s said.

 

“A little bit, yeah,” Kyle says nodding, but then he laces their fingers together and squeezes. “But I’ll take whatever you’re wanting to give me.” And they smile at each other.

 

\---

 

An hour later, the two men are out of the hospital. They went back in to see Ella and told Dan’s parents they would be back in the morning, but had to drop something off at Sharon’s house before they did that. Managing to get the address from Ella and Dan’s father, they get into Dan’s car and start to make their way towards the village.

 

Margaret lives in a Tudor style detached new build on the outskirts of the village in a new estate. They pull the small black car up to the end of the driveway, and there is an Audi A3 and a Toyota Auris in the driveway. Both brand new and look high end. The house had a large paved front garden with foliage in side beds, all beautifully trimmed into strange shapes. There was a security light on the front of the house and when the two men walked up the steps to the front door the light switches on automatically.

 

It is only 8pm, so Dan expected the woman and her husband to be up and answer the door, but with it being a weekday he wasn’t expecting anything else. To his surprise, when the door opened Margaret was standing in front of him in a cocktail dress and high stiletto shoes. Her hair and make-up was immaculate and both Dan and Kyle felt they had interrupted some sort of state dinner. She was talking to someone behind her before turning to the front to see who was on her doorstep.

 

When she sees the two of them standing in front of her - dressed in their travelling clothes and therefore not as glamorous as she was – she startles and pulls the door slightly too so no one else can see them.

 

“What the hell are you two doing here?” she demands, clearly unimpressed to see them. “You’re meant to be in Austria!”

 

“Wow! You clearly keep in touch with your daughter,” Kyle mutters sarcastically and pushes easily past the woman and into her front hall. “Would love to come in, thanks Margaret.”

 

Dan saunters in after him. He looks around the bright hallway. It was also beautifully decorated and they had spent a lot of money on making the space look as expensive as possible.

 

“I don’t want either of you in my house right now!” she hisses at them, keeping the door open as if that would make them leave again.

 

“Oh? Why not?” Dan enquires casually, as if he was there to talk about the weather.

 

“Darling? Who was at the door?” comes a call from the doorway which clearly led into the living room. An older gentleman wandered through to see what was happening and see where his wife had gotten to. He was much older than the woman standing in front of them. He had grey hair and was balding badly on top. He looked as if he was in his early 70’s at least, and was dressed in a well fitted double breasted suit.

 

“Oh, hello there! Are you selling something?” he asks Dan politely, he was giving Kyle a wide berth, clearly not liking his presence or style.

 

“No dear, these are the boys that Sharon is travelling with, they’ve just popped round to give me something. I’ll be back through in a minute.”

 

“Oh, are you Sharon’s dad?” Dan asks him quickly before the man has a chance to leave them. He walks forward quickly with a broad smile and his hand outstretched. “I’m Dan,” he says as the older man shakes his hand warily.

 

“I’m Kyle,” Kyle adds from behind him. He could see that the man was not as enamoured with him as Dan, so he settled for a small wave from behind him.

 

“So it was actually your husband we wanted to see, Margaret, so it’s so good of you to be here as well.” Dan informs them and smiles. He pulls his mobile phone from his back pocket and starts swiping through some screens until he finds what he was looking for.

 

Kyle could see a look of panic running across the woman’s face as she sees Dan looking through his phone. It took all of his composure not to giggle when he saw it.

 

“So, it wasn’t actually from Sharon what I wanted to show you. I managed to get a photo of something and I thought it would only be right as her parents to be aware of what was actually happening while she was on tour.” He explains to them.

 

“Oh really, no it’s fine! I mean Sharon is an adult now so whatever it is I’m sure it’s fine…” Margaret tries to say to them, but her husband interrupts her flow.

 

“No, no Margaret, she may be an adult, but I’m still worried about what happens when she’s away. Please young man, show me what you found.” The older man says to Dan. Dan feels a slight pang of guilt for what he is about to do, but he knows it will be better for the man and for Sharon if he does.

 

With one last look over his shoulder at Kyle who then just nods at him, he hands his phone over to the man in front of him.

 

On the screen was a dark background, but clear and plain as day in the foreground were two adults kissing in a way which was far more than just in a platonic way. It was clear that the woman was Margaret, and for those who knew him that the man was Dave. It was the photo that Dan had threatened Margaret with from Cornwall.

 

“OK, so it wasn’t technically Sharon, but I thought it was something that would definitely impact on her.” Dan says as Margaret realises it was her worst nightmare come true.

 

The look on the woman’s face was one of pure devastation. The older man looked back up at her and then back at the screen a number of times, not quite believing what he was seeing.

 

“I think it would be best if you went,” he says finally and hands Dan’s phone back to him.

 

“Yeah, come on Dan.” Kyle adds from behind him.

 

“You little piss ant.” Margaret spits at him as they both pass to leave the house.

 

“I warned you not to attack us Margaret. That’s for my sister – who by the way tried to kill herself last night.” And he turns from her completely, grasps onto Kyle’s hand and marches them both out of the front door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OK guys, so not many more chapters of this one left. There will be a third part if you all want it. Let me know!


	22. Chapter 22

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So one more chapter left after this guys! Looks like people are interested in Part Three so will start working on that as well.
> 
> Please Enjoy! x

Chapter Twenty Two

It takes them 20 minutes to get back to Dan’s parent’s house and they drive in complete silence. As soon as they pull into the driveway and Dan stops the car and turns off the engine, they both start laughing hysterically.

 

“Did you actually see her face when you took out your phone?” Kyle gasps between laughs. “I actually thought she was gonna have an aneurysm right there!”

 

Dan laughs again, but calms down quickly. He looks over at his boyfriend, currently trying to gasp for air because he was laughing so hard and smiles softly again. It takes Kyle only a couple of seconds to realise that he was the only one laughing and he stops quickly, thinking he had done something wrong.

 

“Well, maybe it wasn’t that funny. I mean we have just probably broken up a marriage,” he says soberly, but for some reason he can’t keep the smile from his face for long. There’s silence between them again, and Kyle starts picking at the leather on the hand brake for something to do with his hands.

 

Dan reaches down and grabs his hand and laces their fingers together. Kyle looks up into his face to try and read what he was thinking. He takes in his entire demeanour. He has stubble from over a day of not shaving, and his beautiful blue eyes were bright and shining again after nearly 48 hours of despair. He has the softest and shyest smile on his face as if he was thinking of doing something, but didn’t know whether it was the right thing to do.

 

Suddenly, Dan brings his right hand up to the side of Kyle’s neck and strokes through the side of his beard with his thumb. Almost unconsciously Kyle leans into the touch and closes his eyes, savouring the touch. Dan moves his hand to behind his neck and pulls him forward toward him.

 

Dan presses two light, soft kisses to his lips and pulls back to take stock of his partner’s face. Kyle still has his eyes closed, but has a look of total contentment over the rest of him. Smiling to himself, Dan reaches forward again and slots his mouth over Kyles, more demanding this time. He teases the younger man’s mouth open slowly, almost millimetre by millimetre, before he gives in and finally plunges his tongue inside. He can feel Kyle smiling into the kiss and as their tongues mesh together and reacquaint themselves, a soft whimper comes from Kyle who is trying to get closer to Dan across the central console of the car.

 

Dan breaks the kiss and pulls away first, not saying anything when Kyle looks at him, but just raises his eyebrows and nods towards the cabin they stay in when they visit. He lets go of his hand to open the car door, and Kyle follows suit quickly, and runs round the car to get close to him again. Kyle wraps both hands around the back of Dan’s head and pushes him against the side of the car to kiss him more forcefully.

 

Pushing him away from him, but keeping hold of a hand, Dan then pulls Kyle towards the cabin, finding the key for the door as he goes and unlocks the wooden door to get inside. Turning on the light, Kyle then slams the door behind him and then wraps his arms fully around the older man in front of him. Sliding his hands down over his buttocks, his grips the two firm globes and starts to encompass his lips again with his own. Dan reciprocates, pushing his own hands down the back of the loose trousers Kyle had been wearing and the pushes him back against the door of the building, catching the bearded man unawares.

 

He quickly slides his hands further down Kyle’s legs, gripping his thighs and coaxing him to wrap his legs around his waist. Dan didn’t look like he would be able to take Kyle’s weight, but the adrenaline and lust flowing through him made him attempt the movement and they both groaned in delight when it was successful and Kyle was being pinned between the wall and his lover.

 

By this point, Dan had started to work his way down from Kyle’s lips, licking at his ear lobes, where the man was oh so sensitive and then working down his neck to the junction of his neck and shoulder and biting and caressing until a large purple mark was forming. Kyle was beginning to get impatient and Dan could feel him trying to get friction against his waiting erection. Dan smiles against his skin as he starts to make whimpering noises, trying to get Dan to hurry up.

 

“A little impatient tonight aren’t we?” he teases, continuing to kiss down his neck and under his chin. “What do you want?” he whispers softly.

 

Completely overtaken with desire by this point, Kyle is unable to respond. He was always loud during sex, yes, but he never could talk, so Dan trying to make him now was making things very difficult for him. He just grunts softly and ruts his hips against the waist of the other man.

 

“Nu-uh, Ky. Use your words…” he trails off, starting to lift the other man’s t-shirt and suckling at the nipples that he uncovers.

 

“Gah… _fuck,_ Dan…please, make me come…I don’t care how!” he manages to gasp out, and Dan looks up at him through his long dark eyelashes.

 

Leaning all of his weight against him to keep Kyle in the same position, he releases his hips and immediately starts working on the buttons and belt of the man’s trousers. He makes short work of his own clothes and gets Kyle’s trousers off of him completely – only letting him touch the ground to remove them before managing to get him back up against the wall.

 

He has a packet of KY in his pocket that he has stolen from somewhere and he makes short work of prepping Kyle for him before pushing the soft, silken head of his own cock against the man’s entrance. Kyle throws his head back, hitting against the door, and gasps as Dan slowly enters him and pushes past all of the muscle and sinks fully into him until his balls are nestled against him.

 

Dan starts thrusting up as hard and fast as he could, knowing that he isn’t going to last too long. He watches Kyle’s hand come down and grab hold of his own cock and starts to jerk it off messily and without any finesse, too far gone in his own feelings and Dan’s fullness.

 

“Dan…so close…harder, please harder…” he pants and this spurs Dan on even more as he almost completely unsheathes himself and slams back into the other man. Dan feels the clenching and tightening of Kyle’s muscles around him and this is pushes him over the edge spectacularly and they both scream as they come, too lost in their pleasure to care about their noise.

 

The calmness that follows is punctuated with pants and heavy breathing as Dan slowly lets Kyle slide to the floor and they then lean against each other, exhausted and spent before their mouths find each other again and they exchange lazy post coital kisses.

 

Heading towards the bathroom to clean up they knew they were going to have a fantastic night’s sleep following this.

 

\---

The theme from Twin Peaks wakes Kyle up the next morning. They had both had a shower and fallen asleep completely naked on Dan’s bed in the cabin. He makes a noise of displeasure and turns over to see Dan still fast asleep next him.

 

“Dude!” he says and elbows him in the side, causing him to gasp awake and look at him. “Phone. And seriously change that ringtone. It’s creepy and annoying and making me dream of midgets.” He says and throws his head down on his pillow again.

 

Dan grabs his phone and answers it without looking at the caller ID. He grunts down the phone to the caller.

 

“What the hell has Kyle done?!” comes shouting down the phone.

 

“Huh?” he answers the caller.

 

“Photos have been released and they’re in the Daily Mail and on gossip sites of him in some girl’s bed, and there’s been rumours of a twitter account talking about how he wants to sleep with all of his female fans by getting them to come onto him,” comes the rambling down the phone.

 

“Dave?” Dan asks again, extremely confused now.

 

“Yes, Dan, it’s me! God are you high?” the man shouts down the phone again. “This broke last night and there’s been a huge backlash against Kyle from your fans. We need to figure out a plan for this…”

 

“No Dave, you don’t need to do anything!” Dan interrupts. “Me and Kyle will figure this out. You won’t be involved in this. Oh, have you spoken to Margaret today?” he asks cheekily down the phone.

 

“Margaret? No, why?” the manager replies.

 

“Yeah, she…might not be the happiest person this morning…” Dan says, and hangs the phone up.

 

“What are we sorting out?” Kyle asks him when the call has ended.

 

“Public relations…you know that thing you’re _so good_ at,” Dan replies sarcastically.

 

He picks his phone up again and gestures to get Kyle to do the same thing.

 

“You go on twitter, I’m gonna check Google news.” He says.

 

Kyle unlocks his phone and hits twitter. He has his phone set up so none of his notifications get pushed through to him so he only sees them when he activates the app.

 

“What the fuck?” he says, seeing the number of notifications significantly higher than he has ever seen them before. He clicks into them and scrolls through everything he’s been tagged in overnight. There are a few of the normal things he sees, but the vast majority are hate filled tweets aimed at him and mainly contain physical threats to him over hurting Dan.

 

“What have I done?” genuinely asking as he looks at Dan with a mightily confused expression on his face. Dan just puffs out a mirthless laugh and shows him the headline that had been put on the website for Heat Magazine.

 

_“EXCLUSIVE! GAY FOR A LAY! Photos and inside scoop of one girl’s night with Bastille’s Kyle!”_

 

“Basically it says you’ve been pretending you’re gay so that you can get girls to come onto you and then sleep with them.”

 

“Huh? What kind of stupid fucked up plan is that?” he asks rhetorically. “Although admittedly it does sound like the kind of stupid thing I might think up…” and Dan swipes the back of his head at that admission. “Ow! OK sorry!”

 

He has a closer look at the photos that are on the screen and he notices that the photos are of him and Ella on the night of the party.

 

“It’s Margaret isn’t it?” Kyle asks Dan and the singer just looks at him and shrugs.

 

“I don’t know, but it looks like it.” He says, kissing Kyle on the forehead when he rolls to get closer to him.

 

“So, what are we gonna do?”

 

“Well that’s what we’ve got to figure out.”


	23. Chapter 23

Chapter Twenty Three

Twitter had taken a very sinister turn following the leak of the pictures and the articles in the press about Kyle and the mystery woman. Thankfully the photos had no face visible and it wasn’t obvious who the girl was. Ella wouldn’t have to worry about anything about her coming out, and this at least made both of them very grateful.

 

Quickly after Dan had hung up with Dave, he had gotten on the phone to his lawyer who was going to make some phone calls to the magazine and paper involved to find out the name of the ‘source’ who had given them the information. Both of the men knew that it wouldn’t have been Ella – still being in the hospital with her parents – so the only other person who it could have been would be Margaret.

 

Kyle was still lying in the bed when Dan came back from his legal call. He was scrolling through the hundreds of tweets he had received over night once the story had broken. While he himself had proclaimed and projected that he didn’t care what people said about him, he was affected by the outbursts coming his way. Dan on the other hand had a flurry of messages offering support, shoulders to cry on and ways to get back at his boyfriend.

 

_“WTF @kyle_jsimmons fucking girls behind Dan’s back? Fucking slut!”_

_“Fuck Bastille! It’s not cool to lie to your fans and then try to get with all the girls coming to your gigs. I am done @kyle_jsimmons, @bastilledan”_

_“So are you gay @kyle_jsimmons? What the actual fuck?”_

_“@kyle_jsimmons ‘I love dan. I am gay’. Also Kyle **fucks every girl he meets** ”_

_“I hope @kyle_jsimmons dies for what he’s done to my @bastilledan! I’ll look after you Dan; I love you”_

A new ‘I Hate Bastille’ feed had also been created, Gay Pride groups had joined the assault and the Daily Mail had announced Kyle Simmons as the main problem with British music in the 21st Century. All in all, it had been a pretty busy night.

 

Kyle tossed his phone on the bed next to him and threw his head back on the pillow sighing loudly.

 

“Is it bad?” Dan asks him, not actually looking at anything other than the magazine article since he had told Kyle about the leak. Kyle turns his head and looks directly in his eyes and nods slowly.

 

Dan picks the phone up and looks at the comments, and whistles when he sees the main comments.

 

“On the plus side, they still love you,” Kyle tries to joke and huffs a small laugh. “It’s just me you have to get rid of, then this’ll all go away.” He adds quietly.

 

Dan cuffs him around the back of the head as soon as he says it, eliciting a small cry from his partner.

 

“Fuck sake Kyle!” Dan says exasperatedly. He picks up his own phone, unlocks it and starts to type something.

 

“What you doing?”

 

“Trying to help.” Is all that Dan says, and Kyle’s phone makes a blip noise in his app to say he had a notification from someone he follows.

 

_“me and @kyle_jsimmons are fine. Haters are gonna hate guys. Don’t believe everything you read”_

He turns his phone onto silent, does the same to Kyle’s and puts them to the side.

 

“We are going to ignore all of this until we hear back from the lawyer alright?” He cups Kyle’s face in his hand and strokes the hair on his face. He leans in for a kiss, and then he can hear the vibrations from his phone going off next to him. Sighing he reaches over to see who is ringing. He doesn’t recognise the number, so answers it suspiciously.

 

“Daniel, it’s me,” his mum’s voice comes down the speaker to him. He greets her back and she explains that Ella would be staying in until the psychiatrist had had a word with her and felt she could be discharged.

 

“Alright. You need us to come up and see her or let you guys get some rest?”

 

“That would be amazing if you could? We won’t be gone long, just to get a shower and a change of clothes?”

 

Dan agreed they would be up to relieve them and said their goodbyes.

 

“Are we gonna tell Ella?” Kyle asks finally.

 

“Yeah. I think we should. And I really think both of you should consider talking to the police about all of this.”

 

“Police? God Dan no! That’s just gonna cause more problems!” Kyle argues quickly.

 

“Hey! I said consider it! You know the lawyers are probably gonna say something like that too!” He tries to calm the man down as well as he could. “We’ve got to get up and go anyway. And I’ll ring the guys and give them an update on the gig situation.”

 

Kyle gets up and heads through to grab the first shower, and Dan watches his naked form head out of the bedroom. Sighing for what felt like the hundredth time that morning he reaches for his phone again, and finds Will’s number to give him the lowdown.

 

“Dan?” The man says when he answers the phone. His voice sounding far away.

 

“Yeah mate. How’s things? Everything alright so far?”

 

“Well people aren’t happy, but they’ll just have to be upset. How’s Ella?”

 

“She’s good man. She’ll be out soon. We’ll come out and meet you in the next couple of days, so in Germany?” Dan says, trying to mentally remember exactly where they were meant to be. “There’s something else Will.” And he hears the man take a sharp inhale in on the other end of the phone.

 

“Yeah, we’ve seen it. I take it that’s what you two were arguing about before you left?”

 

“Something like that Will, yeah. Let’s just say that someone really has it in for us and its getting out of hand. Oh, how’s Sharon?”

 

“She’s good I think?” there’s some muffling on the other end of the phone and Dan can hear Will shout ‘ _Charlo? Is Sharon alright?_ ’ and then some indistinguishable noises back to him. “Yeah, Charlie says she’s OK. Why?”

 

“No reason. Just making sure she’s bearing up what with Ella and everything,” he bullshits quickly. “Alright, we’ll see you in a couple of days, yeah?”

 

“Yeah, man, see you soon.” And the men hang up from each other.

 

\---

 

They get to the hospital an hour later, trying to talk about anything but the huge problem they were currently facing. _(‘midgets, Kyle?’ ‘yes Dan, I’m dreaming about dancing midgets and its getting creepy…’)_

 

Managing to get cups of coffee to wake them up and act as breakfast, they get past the receptionist and head into the observation unit to find Ella and Dan’s parents. There was an older red headed nurse behind the desk this morning who eyed them both suspiciously as they walked into the unit.

 

“Excuse me? What are you doing here? You can’t just walk in you know?” she says to them officiously. She was eating what appeared to be a cream cake and having a cup of tea while she sat at the desk and had a magazine open in front of her.

 

“Sorry, the guy at the front desk let us in?” Dan apologises quickly, and gives the woman his best winning smile. “My sister is here? Ella Smith? My mum rang and asked us to come and sit with her for a while.”

 

“Oh for goodness sake!” the nurse rebukes quickly. “You know she’s 16 and should be here on her own! I can’t believe this!”

 

Dan just gives her a look and Kyle stands behind him with his eyes wide and just mouths ‘wow’ to himself. Obviously disturbed by the commotion going on, Ella’s door opens and Mrs Smith comes out to see her son.

 

“Oh Daniel, thank you so much for coming in! Come in, we’ll give you the update!” and she pulls the singer into Ella’s room.

 

“I’ll be in in a minute!” Kyle says to him. Watching as the door closes, he waits for a beat before strolling casually over to the nurses’ station.

 

The desk was tall and made out of some sort of yellow pine. He stood looking at the nurse with his back to Ella’s door and the desk made it to about his chest. He sets his coffee down on the desk and rests his elbows down and stares at the woman. The older woman stares back at him and they stand like that for about thirty seconds.

 

“Can I help you with something?” The woman breaks first, and Kyle does a mini fist pump internally.

 

“You don’t like your job do you?” Kyle asks her, conversationally and she looks a bit dismayed with the question.

 

“I’m not going to answer that from someone who looks like they’ve been dragged through a hedge backwards!” the woman says to him.

 

Kyle narrows his eyes and looks at the woman again. He twirls his thumb ring and the strokes over the tattoo on his finger. He takes out another packet of cream and spreads it over the area quickly without taking his eyes off of the woman. He starts to nod, realising that he wasn’t going to get anywhere with annoying the woman in front of him.

 

“Well played,” he says, and he turns around to walk into the private room. He opens the door and the speaking stops until they see it’s Kyle coming in.

 

“That woman out there has been a nightmare since she started!” Mrs Smith suddenly declares as soon as Kyle shuts the door. “Everything we’ve asked has been far too difficult for her and she’s done nothing but read since the start of her shift!”

 

“I tried to annoy her,” Kyle pipes up apologetically, and Dan looks at him and smiles.

 

In the bed, Ella was still lying there, but the drip had finished and her needle had been taken out of her arm. Mr and Mrs Smith excuse themselves and hug Dan and Ella before heading out of the door, shutting it behind them.

 

“Ella, there’s something we have to tell you,” Dan says gently. Ella looks up at him. Her eyes are still red from constant crying and emotion and they start to sparkle as she looks at her brother. “Your photos were leaked last night to the papers and someone claiming to have slept with Kyle has given them a story.”

 

Just as expected, the tears start streaming from the teenager’s eyes as she realises what she has done is causing even more problems. Dan’s phone starts ringing again as he tries to comfort his sister and he looks torn about what to do. Kyle gets up from where he has sat himself and takes the phone from him.

 

“Dan’s phone,” he answers.

 

“Who’s this?” comes a female voice from the other end of the phone.

 

“Kyle…who’s this?” he answers her.

 

“Oh, good. Well you can tell your little _fuck buddy_ that it didn’t work.” The venomous voice starts down the phone. “My husband trusts me implicitly and believed me when I told him that this was all a little ploy to get our daughter out of the band. You’ve made yourselves some very dangerous enemies now dear. What happened to you today is only the beginning. When you least expect it, I’ll be there to take you all down - one by one.” And the line goes dead suddenly.

 

The phone vibrates in his hand and he looks down at the notification popping up on the screen in front of him.

 

“Kyle? What is it?” Dan asks from the bed, holding Ella in a comforting embrace.

 

_Dave – all summer German festivals have pulled you._

“I hope your lawyer’s a good one. We’ve got some shit to sort.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OK guys! So this is the last chapter for this part! Thanks for staying with me!   
> Part 3 will start soon...
> 
> Hope you enjoyed this part, and lets see what the future will bring for the guys!


End file.
